


the subtle science and exact art of chess-boxing

by fishcola



Category: Polygon/McElroy Vlogs & Podcasts RPF
Genre: Age Difference, Alternate Universe - College/University, Bullying, Consent Issues, Drug Use, Explicit Sexual Content, Fluff and Angst, Homophobic Language, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Underage Drinking, Internalized Slut-Shaming, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Non-Graphic Violence, Past Relationship(s), Past Sexual Assault, Slurs, Smoking, Trauma, a college coffeeshop story, also a lot of nerding out about chess, also a wild druggie collegiate story, anger issues
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-05-26
Updated: 2019-08-21
Packaged: 2020-03-10 05:07:53
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 11
Words: 56,451
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18931885
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fishcola/pseuds/fishcola
Summary: a bout consists of 11 alternating 3-minute rounds. the game terminates with (1) victory by knockout, (2) victory by checkmate, (3) loss by resignation or disqualification, or (4) draw and rematch.if you've already got a reputation on campus, you might as well deserve it.





	1. fischer random

**Author's Note:**

> **riverblujays** did more than just beta this thing. they're amazing at thinking up ideas and offering help and getting the decisions made that make fic happen. thanks dude :D
> 
>  **WARNING:** as ever, a work of fiction follows wherein you will find the names and likenesses of people whose lives are not my business, as well as voyeuristic snatches of events and people who were intimately my business once upon a time. all characters and events within are original creations. we rpf readers just like goofin off and writing fun shit, ey? and folk i went to college with, it's not about you, ey? avoid if this is off-putting to you, don't take it too serious, and let's keep it all on the DL.
> 
> guys, got another weird one. wanna watch fish have more emotions by-proxy? strap in.

###  ** round 1. fischer random. **

a chess variant in which the starting position of non-pawn pieces is randomized.   
this setup prevents experienced players from using memorized opening lines to gain an advantage.

* * *

Brian’s nervous, the first night he shows up for work at the student café.

 _Caf._ Caf. That’s what Patrick calls it. Not _The_ Caf, just Caf. So Brian needs to call it Caf. No sense giving the senior more reason to scowl at him.

Although honestly, Patrick doesn’t scowl as much as Brian expected. Brian was friggin’ _ter-ri-fied_ when he found out that he’d be splitting shifts with Pat Gill, the last member of the old guard, the tall thin senior from Ridley House with a bad attitude and worse reputation. Everyone tells Brian he’s not gonna last a week, but everyone’s been wrong before.

Patrick _does_ scowl, of course. He scowls more often than he talks, the first few shifts, which makes things hard because Brian doesn’t know how anything works—

he burns himself three times trying to foam milk ( _Fucking TILT it you idiot!_ Pat finally shouts) and he keeps mixing up all the different syrups and he singes off half an eyebrow lighting the propane grill out back—

there’s just a lot of stuff to juggle. The cooking and the register and the not-getting-underfoot. Brian’s the kind of person who’s gotta mess up choreography _spectacularly_ a few dozen times before he finally can get it right. It’s no wonder Pat’s annoyed, really.  

But for fifteen dollars an hour, Brian can afford to be scowled at. It’s better than what he makes in fast food, better than any other job on campus except the night librarian desk and everyone knows you have to blow Todd to get that gig. And Brian’s not. Doing that.

Patrick usually gives up on the scowling by midnight, anyway. Brian thinks, privately, it might be a bit of a show he puts on for customers ( _custies,_ he calls them custies). After midnight the lingering custies are packing up their macbooks—by 1am, the place is usually empty. Overworked premeds and nocturnal art students drop by, sure, but they take their coffees to-go, headed back to the library or the studio. They’ve got hours of shift left by then, and thankfully Patrick doesn’t seem dedicated to spending it all glaring at Brian while the freshman fidgets and tries to find something useful to do with his hands.

He glares a bit, sure, but he also cracks a smile at Brian’s stupid jokes. And he tries Brian’s weird milkshake concoctions. And he lets Brian run the iPod hooked up to the caf speaker for _just one song pleaaaaaaase._

Pat sticks up a warning finger— _If you play Journey again I’m going to call in a favor and get every senior in your dorm to piss in your bed. Even the girls.—_ but he’s kinda smiling when he says it, so he’s probably joking?

Brian doesn’t play Journey, but he does slip in some showtunes from time to time, and maybe he’s kidding himself but he thinks Pat likes it.

And he’s _sure_ Pat likes it when he pulls out a banged-up Wii console one slow night and plugs it in to the menu screen so they can play Smash in between customers. Pat is much better than he is—but he’s really not a dick about it. He just says it’s because Brian mains Peach. _Learn someone better,_ he advises. _You’re overcautious. You don’t need that much recovery. Just stop falling off the damn stage._ Easier said than done.

They play a lot of Smash, actually, those first few weeks. Brian enjoys it when Pat lets him pick random rulesets. Pat enjoys it when custies filter in and want to play and he can bark at them that it’s three-stock, no items, and it costs a dollar to play and two if you lose.

 _Double-or-nothing if you lose to the kid,_ he smirks, which gives Brian a lot of incentive to get better at Smash over the course of September, and eventually he’s okay with Samus and that lightning kid and Pat forgives him if he still plays Peach more often than not.

* * *

Once their little pseudo-gambling-ring is modestly profitable, Pat lightens up a lot. Or maybe Brian just learns to read him better. He’s got a lot of micro-expressions, Brian finds, that look serious but they _aren’t_ , they aren’t, it’s just that Pat doesn’t smile with his mouth if he can help it. He keeps his lips a thin, serious line—but his eyes _flash_ when he thinks something is funny, a little golden glint that springs to life and dances with surprised amusement or keen interest or devilish glee.

It’s actually kinda nice, that Pat’s an eye-smiler. He doesn’t fake smile, _ever_ ever. How could you make your eyes twinkle like that, if you weren’t feeling it? So when Brian says something funny and not-stupid—or kills it with some new flavor of latte—or successfully executes his part of the ol’ pool-hall hustle—and Pat gets that glint, Brian knows he really means it.

And sometimes—not very often, but _sometimes_ —especially late in the witching hour when they’re alone together and very tired—he can rip a real sincere big beautiful open-faced smile out of Patrick. Not a cheeky grin or a half-grimace, but a sudden involuntary expression of joy. Brian’s never met somebody who smiles like that. Like he’s a secret agent trying not to blow his cover. Like he’s a shapeshifter who’s trying to keep his true form hidden from the unworthy mortals. Like he’s been walking in the shadow for ages and just stepped, ever-so-briefly, into the light.

Anyway. Smiles aside, they also start chatting more.

They don’t run in the same circles. Pat doesn’t talk much about his social life, which at first Brian takes to mean _you’re not cool enough, kid, to know what I’m doing_ but he soon figures out it might just mean that Pat thinks his friends and his hobbies are not very interesting to talk about. He’s wrong. Brian is _desperately_ interested in Pat’s friends and his hobbies and how he fits in all his life around his classes, because he seems to be doing a good job, and Brian would like some advice, please. This college thing is...well, it’s _new_ , and it’s a lot. There are so many things to keep balanced: homework and dorm life and working and ducking rumors and finding people who like what he likes and don’t dislike the idea of liking it together occasionally. Brian loves throwing himself into things—whether it’s an exam to pass out of some class or auditions for two different acapella groups—and he hates disappointing people—and he knows intellectually that this is going to make life very hard as he fills his plate with too much to physically _do—_ but why even go to college, if you don’t give stuff a try?

It’s good, though, to come back down to earth from time to time. Pat centers him, a bit, this skinny scowly sexy senior with low energy and an utter disinterest in social affirmation. It’s comforting.

Attractive, even.

 _Stop it you idiot,_ Brian scolds himself, when he catches himself looking a little too long at Pat’s jawline. He’s out in front smoking while Brian’s washing dishes. Cigarettes _shouldn’t_ be sexy, but…well. Brian doesn’t really know Patrick well enough to nag him about kicking the habit. Or perhaps that’s just justification for his own habit—

watching the slender body standing in the dark, sharp-angled face lit up by moonlight, wisp of smoke curling up into the abyss in a brief moment of silent contemplation—

 _He wouldn’t touch you with a ten-foot pole, Gilbert,_ he tells himself, more firmly.

Pat’s made it clear that whatever social life he has, it certainly doesn’t involve any gangly-looking freshmen in acapella groups. He’s not interested in DDR club. He’s not coming to a fucking improv show. And when Brian floated the idea of Pat dropping by a Lemelson House happy hour, and possibly getting his favoritest coworker a few drinks, the turndown was _so_ vicious—sudden and sharp and _nasty_ —so bad that Brian’s hands legitimately trembled too hard to make milkshakes for a half hour.

He sucks it up, though, and swallows down his disappointment, and chalks it up to the fact that drinking with a weird little freshman is last on Pat Gill’s list of favorite Friday activities.

Which means it does surprise him when Pat shows up to their next caf shift with a sixpack of beer.

“I don’t do happy hours,” Pat explains flatly, dropping the cans in the fridge. “I don’t play beer pong, and I don’t drink natty light, and I don’t like watching frat idiots puke. Hope you like IPAs.”

“No clue,” Brian says honestly, because he can’t say something cool when he’s smiling like an idiot.

Pat pushes back his hair and eye-smiles. “Cute. Well, you’ll probably hate it, but at least you won’t be able to drink it fast enough that you fall asleep under the register.”

Brian pouts, because he _can_ hold his drink, thank you very much, and he says as much, and Pat rolls his eyes at this, and then of course there’s some show-offing and some snarky ribbing and they end up sipping beers together and finishing Pat’s essay about  _The Colonizer and The Colonized_ which is due, apparently, at midnight. He hasn’t even _started_ it, which gives Brian contact anxiety, and he begs permission to help with such desperation that Pat, bemused, acquiesces.

“What’s your thesis,” Brian says, erasing the tiny whiteboard in the back frantically.

“I don’t really do thesis first,” Pat murmurs. “I just write until I know what I’m talking about.”

“Pat you don’t have _time_ for that,” Brian says, chagrined, and Pat chuckles.

“All right, all right. You take these two custies and I’ll figure something out.”

They hammer it through, eventually. Pat _does_ write fast, and well, thank God, and it’s a light evening, and it’s true that the TA probably doesn’t actually care if it's emailed at midnight or at 4am, really.

“Did you used to be a writing tutor or something,” Pat asks, as Brian scans his draft in the early hours of the morning. “I thought you were a science nerd.” He pauses. “Or a theater nerd, I guess. Or a music nerd? You can’t be good at writing too. That’s not fuckin’ fair to the rest of us.”

Brian grins. “I contain multitudes of nerds, Patrick. But I’m not like good at—” he gestures. “This stuff. You’re really good at academic writing. I have no idea how you came up with this that fast. I just can catch typos. And I like outlining.”

“No one likes outlining,” Pat scoffs, shutting his computer in front of Brian’s face.

“You haven’t even sent it yet,” Brian moans, anguished. “You’re three _hours_ late.”

“Eh, they’ll live without my genius for a coupla more hours,” Pat teases, with that look he gets when he’s trying to rile Brian up by yelling at customers, or doing knife stunts, or _accidentally_ unplugging the Wii when it looks like someone is about to beat Brian in a match. It makes Brian’s heart race, that twinkling look. “You wanna play Smash and finish the beer before we clean up?”

“Sure,” Brian says, before he even really registers what the question was, because every single solitary thought has drained right out of his stupid head except for a generic synonym for _yes, please._

* * *

Brian does get to meet a few of Pat’s friends, eventually, although they tend to show up in startling ways.

Justin appears on a dark night, bursting through the door at exactly one AM like the friggin’ ghost of Christmas past and nearly giving Brian a heart attack. He’s _absolutely_ wasted, raucous-loud, wearing a Hawaiian shirt and flip-flops even though it’s raining outside. He rolls up to the register and immediately demands access to the deep-fryer.

“Uh, I can’t—you can’t go back there—what do you want to order?” Brian bites his lip nervously. Customer service is not, like, that _hard_ , but he definitely gets a little anxious serving drunk people.

“I don’t want to _order_ , my good man” Justin gestures grandly. “I have a vision. But if you’d rather—how much for you to deep fry these Oreos for me?”

“I…” Brian blinks. “I don’t have a button for that. Let me…ask?”

“Good good,” Justin shoos him. “And then I also have some twinkies, so...”

He flees back to find Pat. The senior doesn’t get too testy with him for asking questions anymore, as long as he waves to get attention before touching him. “Hey, Pat? Uh…there’s a guy who wants us to like… _fry_ something...we can’t do that, right?”  

Pat snorts. “That’s Justin. Here, just let me— _HOOPS_!”

“What UP, my dude!” Justin pokes his head through the patio door. “Your associate tell you the plan?”

“The gist.” Patrick’s looking at Justin with real affection, which makes Brian worry, because Justin definitely does not seem sober enough to be having exciting adventures with hot oil. “What’ve you got this time.”

“J-man’s got the good stuff,” Justin whispers conspiratorially. “Check it out. Just hit the convenience store on the way over.” He shows off his stash of sweets, and Pat chuckles.

“Lemme handle these for you.” Justin yields them readily. “You go chill inside. The kid—Brian, this is Brian—he makes a good hot drink. Let him make you a raspberry hot chocolate or whatever monstrosity he’s got this week.”

Justin wheels on Brian with interest, and claps him on the back. “Ooh, you got my number there. How much for one of those.”

“Like, two, three bucks?” Brian estimates, because he really has to play calvinball with the pricing for his nonstandard drink creations. He usually just goes one-dollar-per-syrup-pump and figures the steamed milk is _gratis_. “White chocolate or dark chocolate?”

“You _know_ white chocolate, my man.”

Brian’s relieved when Justin comes inside, away from the hot things, and sprawls himself across a chair. He makes his new favorite drink—too sweet, says Pat, but that’s how Brian likes them—and passes it over—runs into a little challenge at the register—

“Oh, sorry, you can’t pay in cash,” Brian dips his chin apologetically. “Gotta be student credit. They don’t let me open the register.”

“Nah, it’s cool,” Justin shoves the money in his front shirt pocket and pats it, a strangely intimate gesture. “Patrick’ll show you what to do. I’ll just take a togo-lid and go nip out and get my treats. Seeya round, junior.”

Justin traipses off, presumably to collect his newly-fried things, leaving Brian quite bemused and sure he’s handled that transaction wrong… but not entirely sure how he could have done it better?

A few minutes later, Pat slips in. He looks a shade contrite. “Sorry about that.”

“About what?”

“Justin can be a little much when he’s had a few. Hope he didn’t bother you.”

“No,” Brian says quickly. “He was okay. But he tried to pay in cash?” He waves the dollars.

“Yeah, he’s not a student,” Pat shrugs. “He goes to the community college—he’s just visiting his brother Trav—just swipe your own card and then keep the cash. Or I can do it, if you don’t want it.”

Duh. Of course. Brian does that, and looks at the money in his hand. “He _tipped_ me,” Brian blinks.

Pat smirks. “The joys of serving someone from the outside. Don’t get used to it, they’re few and far between. A couple alums that like me. That’s it.” He taps Brian’s wrist. “Now, it’s not _completely_ above-board, taking cash from non-students, so best keep that on the DL, all right? Or just tell me if you’re not comfortable with it. I can handle that bit.”

“It’s fine. It’s not stealing.” Brian quirks a little smile. “And if I get in trouble I’m just gonna say you worked here before me and you told me it was okay.”

“Hah! Figures.” Pat brushes back his hair with a grin. “I see how it’s gonna be. _Patrick said I could do it. Patrick’s the one that stashes liquor in the bookcase. I had no idea he was out there smoking, Dean Curtis.”_

“I do not sound like that,” Brian pouts. “I will sell that way better. I’ll even cry.”

“Oh you little shit.” The taller boy pinches his cheek mockingly, and it isn’t hard but Brian feels the touch _burn_. “You’re gonna get away scot-free, with that baby face of yours.”

“That’s the plan,” he chirps, bright and smiley, and wishes, wishes that hand would touch his face again. It doesn’t, though, and Pat just wanders off, fake-muttering and chuckling to himself.

* * *

Simone is even more alarming, because one night quite late Brian just hears _Behind you!_ and something tall and dark and slender darts past him when he’s digging elbow deep in the freezer.

“C-can I...help you?” He stammers, but the dark-haired dark-eyed girl is already helping herself.

She snorts quite loud. “I work Mondays, toots, it’s cool.”

“Is that Roach?” Pat yells from out back “Brian, are you letting her steal shit?”

Simone—well, Brian comes to learn she is very _forward_ —grabs him quick around the waist and digs her pointy chin right into his shoulder and _squeezes_ him like he’s her kid brother. “Uh-huh you are,” she cackles near his ear. “Whatchoo gonna do about it, kid.”

Brian pauses, stupidly tongue-tied, and thinks for two seconds too long before hollering back, “She already paid, Pat!”

She grins and releases him with a friendly pat on the head. Well, it might be friendly, or it might be more like he’s an obedient puppy, he’s not really sure.

“I know you’re lying,” Pat bellows, and comes in fake-grumbling to introduce the two. “Brian, Simone. She’s Ridley scum. Simone, Brian. He’s a Lem brat. You’ll probably hate each other.”

As it turns out, this isn’t true—Brian covers Monday shifts sometimes, and he finds he likes Simone quite a lot. She’s quick and funny and her laugh is ridiculously contagious, and she is super friggin’ helpful with history homework and never minds if Brian falls asleep in the chair next to the sink. 

* * *

It’s November before Brian _finally_ starts shaking out some of Pat’s hobbies, besides drinking and smoking and listening to music. The snow's bad, so even though it's late there’re no customers. All they've done all night is sneak vodka and eat quesadillas—the best thing they can make without going outside to fight the grill.

The senior’s bending thoughtfully over his computer screen, but no mouse in sight, so he’s not playing a game.

“Essay?” Brian chirps, because Pat lets him help more often than not, even though he doesn’t really need the assistance. Brian likes to find out about the Russian Revolution and queer theory and continental philosophy, particularly when it’s being opined at him by such a sexy and foul-mouthed lecturer. “Can I help?”

“Nah,” Pat cricks his neck. “Not an essay. Maybe you can help though—chess puzzle—got any ideas? I can do it in seven but there should be an answer in six.”

Brian moves over to look at the screen, and stares at it, mystified. “Six _what_?”

“ _Moves_ , idiot. Six moves. To checkmate black. You don’t play chess?”

“I know the horses move in little L’s,” Brian cocks his head in a way he knows will make Pat groan and also smile.

“Knights. Oh my lord. All right. Hold down the fort and look at this puzzle for ten minutes, I’m going to run grab a board from Ridley.”

Brian bites his lip. “But what if there’s a rush? It’s still early. I can’t run register and grill.”

Pat waves his hand at the snow. “Kid, no one’s coming. It’s a fuckin’ blizzard. If they come in, just cut their card in half and tell them it’s for the hubris of challenging nature’s might.”

This makes Brian giggle. He _sees_ the giggle register in Pat’s slightly-drunk mind, make him quirk his eyebrow. When Pat has a few he tends toward roguish—a few more drives him toward _fiendish—_

“Oh, you think I’m _kidding_ , don’t you,” Pat says lowly. “You think I haven’t cut a student ID in half? Just call me over next time some asshole is trying to order somethin’ fancy at quarter-to-three. Let’s see them use their term balance on goofy shit without it."

“You use your balance on cigarettes,” Brian says, and it’s supposed to be teasing, but it comes out breathy, because he’s oddly captivated by the hand on his arm and the dark smile. Brian’s heard that the old guard of Ridley House ran caf with an iron code of anarchic revelry. It must be true. The vestiges of it still swirl around Patrick in a way that Brian can’t help feeling intoxicated by, even if it’s bad for him. _Especially_ if it’s bad for him.

Brian has a _type,_ okay.

“You just don’t appreciate the irony that the school gives me a scholarship for books and lets me spend it on smokes,” Pat squeezes his arm in a way that might be fond or might be flirty or might just be nothing at all. “I’m getting a board. Be back in ten.”

He darts off, leaving Brian’s heart feeling soft, like he’s bit of wax that’s been held too close to a flame.

 

* * *

 

The rules of chess are, at least, somewhat familiar to Brian. Protect your king. Don’t lose your queen. Pawns move two spaces at the beginning. Stuff like that comes back pretty easily. He even kind of remembers castling, though _en passant_ is new. Pat drills him on which pieces are most valuable, and he mostly gets that right.

“I got it, I got it,” he assures Pat, once he knows how all the pieces are allowed to move and what the objectives are. Look, Brian’s played a lot of games. This can’t be more complicated than Pokémon or Magic or shit like that, right?

He’s two moves into the first game, though, when Pat stops him. “What are you _doing_.”

“...uh…moving pawns? I thought pawns don’t, like matter that much.”

“Okay, I’ll let you start with _g4_ but you can’t follow that shit up with _f3_.” At Brian’s blank look he tries to explain—something about piece development—control of the middle of the board—openings—Brian just lets the words slosh around in his head, and tries not to smile at Pat’s earnest exasperation.

“Pat I—maybe if you just beat me like four hundred times I’ll get it? I don’t think I can remember all that. Can’t we just keep playing.”

Pat looks at him and quirks his mouth. “You don’t understand, kid. I’ve already beat you, with an opening like that. I just need to sweep you up.”

This seems like a _wild_ overstatement. “That’s crazy. We’ve only moved three pawns, Pat.”

“Hah! All right then. Here.” He moves a pawn, and then gets up to make another drink.

Pat wins that game in twelve moves. The next one takes fifteen, but only because Brian’s allowed take-backs. After the seventh game, Brian is very proud of himself for capturing at least _one_ piece that isn’t a pawn, but Pat is frowning and brushing back his hair.

“This can’t be fun for you.” Pat brushes back his hair. “You’re going to give up if we keep doing this. I need to give you some kind of handicap.”

“It’s fine,” Brian shrugs ruefully. “I’m a good sport.”

“Well, _I’m_ not,” Pat scowls. “You literally just played the same moves that you did earlier. I could just play really stupid, but then you’ll never get better and I’ll be bored off my ass. Gimme a second.”

Brian gets up to make himself a coffee and hides his smile. He feels good, watching Pat scowl and try to figure out how to teach him and also keep him entertained along the way. He wants to say _I could literally lose to you all trimester and still enjoy it_ , but that sounds hopelessly starry-eyed even in his head. He could, though. Lose a million games. Just to watch Pat ponder the board and cross his arms and glance up at him—half-pitying, half-disappointed—but trying not to let it show too much, because he doesn’t want Brian to get discouraged.

It’s _wonderful_. It makes Brian feel small and stupid in the best way, the way that makes a blush run up his back. He’s never minded making an ass of himself for a little attention. It makes his blood run hot.

“I’ve got it,” Pat announces. “Here. This is how you’re gonna learn.” He holds out the box of pieces—they’re just cheap plastic things, nothing fancy—and makes Brian take it. “So okay. Scramble up the pieces and lay them all out. Black on one side, white on the other. Keep the king on his square, though, okay? And everything else just random, but in the first two ranks.”

Brian does this, perplexed. When he’s done, the pieces are sort of asymmetrically scattered, but in two neat rows, as requested. “Okay. Now we play...like this?”

“Yeah, but first you’re going to take your time—and really _look_ at the board, and _think_ about it—and decide which color you want to play. White or black. And if you pick the better side I’ll let you play it, okay? So pick right.”

Brian blinks. “Oo...kay.” He glances down at the board. The pieces are the same, obviously, on either side, but it’s not so crazy that one random layout might be better than the other. He looks at them for a while. He sees that one side is definitely going to lose a rook. He sees where the queen is stuck. He’s not...sure which of these is most important...but surely you don’t want to lose a piece _right away_ …?

“I’ll be black?”

Pat glances at the board for a few seconds. “Good. Then move.”

This scramble-chess is interesting, because although the games go brutally fast Brian at least gets to take a few pieces before he loses. Pat feeds him little dribs and drabs of strategy— _remember, if you put me in check, I’m gonna have to deal with that before I take your pieces_ — _no, no, this side is better can’t you see the bishops?—that move is stupid, take that back, but first tell me why it’s stupid—_ and at least he’s not losing in exactly the same way each time.

Over the next couple shifts the game evolves—Pat gives up on the randomness and starts setting up the two sides so that one is better than the other, and he makes Brian tell him why before he’s allowed to play. Then Brian graduates to setting the pieces up on his own, giving himself as much advantage as he can figure out how to do.

They’re pretty much _always_ playing chess, after that—it’s a good game to play even when there are custies, because you can just look at the board while you work and then call _your move_ over your shoulder and it doesn’t matter if the game progresses slow or you’ve got your earbuds in or you have to stop and make three orders of French fries, or play a round of Smash, in between.

It’s…well, it’s surprising how _patient_ Pat is. He doesn’t praise much but he also doesn’t scold, really, either, just says flat-out if a move is too stupid or suggests something Brian should think about during his next move.

“You’re becoming quite aggressive with your queen,” Pat mutters one evening, “I should probably train that out of you. But at least you’re not just pushing pawns.”

It makes Brian’s heart flutter, these little statements. It makes him feel a little rush of hope. That Pat is putting _effort_ into him. Training him. He still rarely wins, and when he does it’s usually because his position is stupid good from the get-go. But Pat seems to think he’s improving—he says as much to Simone, who drops by every now and again and slips behind the counter to make herself a redeye.

“Ooh, I didn’t know you had it in you,” she winks at Brian, staring at the board.

“I—uh—thanks?” he says tentatively. “But I’m pretty sure I’m losing.”

“But you’re _cheating_. You’ve got two white bishops.” She reaches out for one, and Pat swats her hand away.

“No, no, kid’s fine. We’re playing—well, it’s not Fischer Random, but something like that. He’s a newbie.”

“Ah.” She folds her arms. “He’s not gonna learn how to play properly with that garbage, though.”

Pat shrugs. “He can learn that later. He just needs to, like, see the board right now.”

“You play chess too?” Brian looks up at Simone curiously, as she’s looking down hawk-sharp at the locations of the pieces.

She shrugs. “Everyone in Ridley plays a little. It’s like a thing. ‘Specially the math majors.” Her grin is toothy, that predatory one she gets when she looks like she’s trying to either freak Brian out or draw him in. “Safe sex, unsafe drugs, chess, and burning shit down. That’s what we _do_.”

“I need to get invited to these parties,” Brian says thoughtfully, and Simone laughs.

“Come over anytime you want, twinkle-toes. It’s not _parties_ so much though. But I’ll smoke you out. Here. Give me your hand.”

She pulls out a pen and sharpies her number up his wrist. It makes his blood thrill, a little, for whatever reason, the careless way she marks him up. Everything with Simone is so intimate.

After she lets him go, she watches them play for a minute—though they’re not playing, really, just sitting and staring at the board waiting for Patrick to pick his next move.

“You should put Pat on a timer, kid,” she grouses.

Patrick grimaces. “He probably should. He’s starting to get good enough I have to think a little.”

Brian knows he looks stupid, when he dips his head like that, but he can’t help it. The praise goes right to his face in a red rush.

“Awwww, look at him,” Simone crows and ruffles his hair. “Look at that smile. What a _cutie_. Here, kid, let me help you get out of this mess. May I?”

At his nod, she perches herself on the arm of Brian’s chair and leans over him, watching. Pat sighs and makes his move, and Simone’s in Brian’s ear almost immediately, whispering advice. She smells kinda floral, possibly perfume or possibly gin, and her voice tickles Brian’s ear, but he does see why it’s a good move.

Pat scowls. “Great, now I just get to play _you_. What’s he gonna learn from that?”

“ _Style_ ,” she throws out a hand dramatically. “Here, let’s do this—I’ll take a shot every time we take a piece, yeah? That’ll even the playing field.”

“Fine,” Pat sighs. “You’re gonna get this knight so you might as well go find a drink now.”

She salutes and goes scampering for it, and when she comes back with her shot and one for Brian too, she pushes him to the side and shoves her beautiful long-legged self beside him on his chair. She also flips out her phone and sets a timer for 2 minutes, waves it in one hand in front of Pat’s face. He sighs, long-suffering but secretly amused, Brian thinks, and moves his rook with a little cough. Simone ignores him, drops it on the table and wraps an arm around Brian to clink glasses with him. The vodka burns but not terribly.

Brian feels like his heart’s been scrambled a bit. But it’s not scrambled in a _bad_ way—though he’s sure most of his other friends would disagree—pressed between the attentions of two of the most notorious seniors on campus—drinking with them when he’s technically _working_ —letting Simone run her black-tipped fingernails along his neck—and Patrick _looks_ at them, when she does, in a particular sort of way—

He shivers a little bit. It’s...an unusual position, sure, but he thinks if he’s clever, he might just be able to play it. He reaches out and moves his queen. “Check.”  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fischer random, invented by the eponymous bobby fischer, is a good time for newbs, although what pat and brian are playing here is a hybrid between that and Really Bad Chess, my recent chess addiction.


	2. hak kor erawan

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter contains homophobic slurs and some bullying.

###  ** round 2. hak kor erawan. **

(break the elephant's neck)   
block the opponent’s incoming punch. grab neck with both hands. thrust knee up into opponent’s head 

* * *

As it turns out, the kid isn’t a total asshole. Go figure

Pat, of all people, should know not to judge too quickly. But it’s hard not to jump to conclusions when the kid shows up—a freshman, a fucking _freshman,_ and from _Lemelson—_ and he just lookslike he’s in the right dorm, too, this Lem kid: jumpy and tidy, with cute coiffed hair and a wide theater-kid smile. He looks _a-dor-a-ble_. He looks friendly. He looks like a try-hard. He looks like he’s already on Pat’s last nerve. He looks like Pat’s gonna make him cry. Probably not even on purpose.

(It turns out he’s right, about that.)

Even his name is annoying: _Gilbert_ is stupidly close to _Gill_ , so Pat finds he can’t bark it out at the kid without feeling like he’s addressing himself. So _Brian_ it is. And Brian is—

well, he’s okay, actually. He does have relentless energy. And he does try to make himself useful. But he doesn’t get in the way that much, and he’s okay at Smash, and the music he likes doesn’t suck. Pat’s never understood semitones or diminished sevenths or whatever bullshit the kid goes on about, but he has good taste. Brian also speaks some Spanish, which is nice, because he makes quick friends with Luis who takes out the trash bins at the end of the night and does harder work for way less pay than Pat’s sorry ass.

Luis always liked Pat, even though Pat’s an asshole who wastes his student loan money on cigarettes and ditches class for no good reason, and if Pat were in Luis’s shoes he wouldn’t waste a single friendly smile on himself. So it’s nice, when he hears Brian asking about Luis’s kids and sees him swapping tupperwares of no-bakes for homemade hot sauce. It’s good they get along.

It actually becomes kinda excellent, working with Brian. Pat likes money and he likes scowling at shit-heel ivy-leaguers, so he never minded working at caf. Sure, it was better before the old guard left—but they didn’t get expelled, in the end. The brief wave of admin supervision in the aftermath had washed over. Now it was back to how it’d always been, minus a few of Ridley’s finest who were now _persona non grata_ on campus.

Now it’s just Pat and Simone and Ari, and Luis who comes in at 3:30 to close up with a warm smile and an _estas bien, niños?_ and a rotating cast of frat brats who never last longer than a few weeks.

Brian lasts, though.

Even though Pat makes him cry. The first time he cries—

—well, actually, that’s not quite right. Brian teared up in September, when Pat came roaring in thirty minutes late with a _raging_ hangover and screamed that the kid better stop smiling like he wanted a fist in his fucking teeth.

Pat regrets that, for the record.

Anyway. The day he _really_ makes Brian cry he is actually trying to be a decent human being, for once. Busy days mean one man on front and one on back, and cold days mean the poor asshole on back is out freezing their fucking fingers off in the snow, flipping burgers on a sputtering gas flame and pulling endless batches of fries and nuggets and mozzarella sticks and every other stupid thing that makes you want to vomit with the stink of oil. Brian doesn’t complain—but he also doesn’t seem to have any clothes that kept his stupid ass warm, and Pat feels like some kind of sick evil stepmother when Brian shuffles in to close up with blue lips and clumsy stiff fingers after a long night outside.

Pat actually likes being out back. He can listen to music and not worry about having to curtail his temper. He isn’t good at kow-towing to his _peers_ , who leave their five-dollar coffees half-drunk on the table for him to clean up, who don’t go to class and don’t give a shit and don’t get expelled, who leave with their gentleman’s C’s and their _networks_ and their _prestigious diplomas_ without ever having met the bursar, and certainly without having to beg her for an extra month, please, just to figure some shit out.

Out back is better. Not so much to think about. And Brian is good with custies. He jokes and smiles and apologizes a lot. Like a normal person.

But that day, Pat comes in with a pile of fries, and Brian isn’t smiling.

“You need a hand in here, kid?”

Brian looks from scooping ice cream—he looks deeply grateful for the offer. It surprises Pat, the gratitude. Brian _never_ needs a fucking hand, unless it’s a hand coming up with shit to fidget with when he’s done with all Pat’s work too.

“Yeah. Yeah, that’s be good.” Brian lets out a tight breath. “Um, I’m a few coffees behind right now—could you just—thanks.”

Pat grabs the receipts and fills the coffees. They’re easy enough. Brian must be having an off day—he’s usually good on register. Maybe he’s distracted by the crew of particularly repugnant jocks lurking, waiting for their orders. Understandable.

While handing some girl her green tea ( _three goddamn dollars_ , that hot water and tea bag), Pat watches Brian call out for the milkshake he’s making. One of the jocks swaggers up to get it at the counter.

But he doesn’t take his fucking drink and go. Asshole’s hassling Brian about something, albeit pretty quietly. The kid looks near tears.

Pat slams down the coffee he’s making mid-pour and steps closer.

“—come on, how many times are you going to fuck this up—”

“I—I’m not remaking it for you again.”

Brian’s voice is wavering, but he’s also annoyed. Pat likes that annoyance, that edge. So he doesn’t jump in yet, even though this jock—Pete Driscoll, he recognizes the stupid fucking smirk—is a complete fuck. Maybe for once Brian’ll get pissed enough to tell off a custie.

“I said chocolate and strawberry milkshake, _fag_ , not this watery trash—”

Oh, how fucking original _._ Driscoll’s definitely drunk, and definitely a homophobe, and he’s definitely showing off for the dumb girl Pat recognizes a few steps away, and she and her stupid sorority friends are laughing like he said something clever.

Still, he hesitates. He’s happy to go over there and make Pete skitter like a cockroach—that swagger’ll dissolve like toilet paper when faced with a scowling angry faggot who is hip to his bullshit—but _shit_ it’d be nice if this sweetfaced little freshman can bust out that sharp wit Pat’s seen scratches of and draw some blood. _C’mon, kid_ , he roots, _Tell him it’s the perfect consistency to pour up his ass. You can do it._

“I’m not—there’s nothing wrong with it.” Brian folds his arms in front of him, nervously.

“Isn’t it your job to make me happy?”

“No,” Brian mutters, unfolding his arms again. He’s acutely uncomfortable, it’s clear, but holding firm. “Not when you’re being an asshole.”

If the girls weren’t here, that’d probably be enough, but—

“ _What’d_ you call me, cocksucker?” The jock’s pushy. He’s sidled around the hip-height counter, now, getting up in Brian’s face. The kid isn’t retreating, but when the taller guy gestures aggressively Brian flinches.

Pat feels a quick rush—

_oh fuck don’t show him weakness kid he’s going to—_

and Pat’s getting over there, to help, just a few quick steps but—

the damage’s already done.

Brian’s got ice cream all down his shirt and Driscoll is laughing, and the sorority girls are being cunts like usual and Brian is blushing crimson red and cringing from cold and humiliation. Fuck.

Pat can’t hit the guy and make it look like an accident with Brian in the way. So he just steps in as quick as he can, pushes himself in front of Brian, and shoots his mouth off, like usual.

“Oh my god, Samantha—you were right, Pete _does_ have a milk fetish—they always say if you take them off the tit too early they end up with mommy issues.”

Samantha cocks her head stupidly. The stupid girls giggle. Driscoll scowls at being upstaged, and it’s an ugly, stupid scowl, up close—he remembers this guy, now, and how he almost got Simone arrested—although the guy is three inches taller and about six inches wider than Pat remembers. Doesn’t that just figure.

“Get the _fuck_ away from him, Driscoll,” Pat hisses, sharp, “or I’ll break your goddamn fingers. And then think of all the jerking off to dairy porn you’ll miss out on.”

It’s a simple taunt in a language even this fuck can understand. In front of this girl. Pat knows how he looks. Skinny-sallow, long greasy hair, glasses. Not like the kind of guy who can throw a punch. Just the type Pete likes to fuck with. The burn of excitement is rising up Pat’s spine, as he sees the next few seconds play out. C’mon, big guy. I dare you.

Driscoll starts to wind up, and Pat smiles.  

Then he feels a frantic tug at his sleeve. _“Pat_ ,” Brian is inserting himself, for some fucking unknown reason. “It’s fine—I j-just—”

And _fuck_ —

“ _Pete!_ Don’t—”

and that’s enough, the moment is gone. Cooler heads prevail amid the absolute moron squad. They shuffle their dickhead friend off before he can start any proper shit. No cool parting slams, either—just some vague threats in Pat’s direction that he should watch himself or go tend to his boyfriend or have fun sucking cocks or whatever the fuck.

Pat has tuned them out already, though.

“ _Fuck_ ,” he bites at Brian, shaking his arm in frustration, where the kid is tug-tug-tugging insistently. He slams his hand down on the counter. Goddammit. That would have _worked_. “Why the fuck did you stop him?”

“...huh?”  

“Caf has _cameras,_ you idiot,” Pat growls, frustrated, breathing hard with foiled adrenaline. “He was gonna hit me square in the fucking face like the moron he is and get his ass suspended.”

And _fuck,_ nothing would be sweeter than for Driscoll PNGed for the rest of the fucking semester—no visiting those bitches in the dorms—no more late douchebaggery at caf—only allowed on campus when his classes are in session— _god_ it would have been good, for that dickbag to get stuck in counseling until his pathetic ass chokes up some reason he’s such a fuck—

Brian steps back, and his wide-eyed face is such a bizarre rush of emotions that it pulls Pat out of his swirling thoughts of what might-have-been. He’s—

shit—

it’s like watching an Oscar-winning biopic. Confused. Angry. Grateful. Humiliated. Afraid.

And _that’s_ when the kid starts crying, when there’s still cold milkshake all down his shirt, when Pat’s already been too late to help but definitely not too late to royally fuck it up.

“Hey, kid, no—no—cut it out—I mean—”

But Brian is a total fucking mess now. He’s sobbing—big, snotty, real sobs of hurt and guilt and redirected adrenaline. It takes full minutes before the hitching and sniffling and hysterical apologizing lets up, as if the kid’s done fucking anything wrong at all. 

Then some shitass sophomore shows up for a latte—

and Pat barks “ _We’re fucking closed get the fuck out!”—_

which is really a _courtesy_ , if you think about it—

but Brian doesn’t see it that way and it sets him off again—

and the crying this time is drier but way worse, punctuated by more breathless apologies and so ragged it sounds like it hurts his throat. He’s slid to the ground and is hiding pitifully behind the counter. Pat sits next to him—realizes he needs to stop telling Brian to shut up, or else the kid’ll never shut up. Instead, he just watches and rubs his shoulder, because touching a shoulder seems like a reasonably human thing to do. Friends touch shoulders, right?

Being this close to Brian’s face is a little odd—he’s red and blotchy and those bags under his eyes look _way_ worse up close—and it gives Pat’s stomach a funny feeling that is familiar, but definitely bad. That kind of feeling you get when you catch yourself eyeing your little brother’s girlfriend and realize that she has nice tits. And not only that, but you realize that this thought, though previously unexamined, isn’t really _new_. Fuck.  

 _Patrick Gill are you really thinking about sticking your tongue down this freshman’s throat right now?_ the devil in his head screeches in glee. _Right after you made him cry?_

Something of the disgust at himself must show in his face, because Brian looks up at him and starts crying with renewed vigor. Pat gets up then, manages to blurt out “wait a minute, kid, I’ll be right back,” and turns the sign to closed, and grabs the handle of tequila he’s been saving for a special occasion from its spot behind the napkins.

_Ah yes, Gill, lower those inhibitions. We both know you have only the best of intentions._

That devil voice shuts up after a drink, though, and although that’s probably a bad thing for both of them, two drinks at least steady Brian’s nerves and stop him from making those pathetic little gasps.

“Sorry,” the kid says again. He’s stripped off his shirt, now, the sticky mess with it. They’re both sitting on the ground still, legs touching, Pat wavering on whether touching his shoulder is still friendly and acceptable, now that it’s skin-to-skin. “Didn’t know you were going for—that.”

“I told you, it’s fine,” Pat waves him off. “You couldn’t have known. I shouldn’t have snapped at you. Totally misdirected. I was just pissed.”

“Why?” Brian asks shyly, and Pat feels a little tug at his heart that it will take more tequila to ignore.

“ ‘cause he was fucking _shoving you around_ , Brian, and that’s what Driscoll _does_ , goes around being an absolute domineering jackass to anyone in his fucking path, and I’m sick of his shit and how much his parents pay to make sure he never answers for it.”

Brian absorbs this information, still peering into Pat’s face. 

“…would you really have let him hit you?”

Pat allows himself a fiendish grin. “Oh, _fuck_ yes. He’s a big boy, Brian. If he popped, he’d really do some damage. Maybe break my nose. Then admin would _have_ to fucking do something, there’s no way to squirm and squiggle their way out of that. Like they usually do with Driscoll.”

He’s still enjoying his vindictive mental image of Driscoll trembling before the deans when Brian’s arms suddenly wrap around his ribcage.

 _He’s hugging you_ , Pat’s brain realizes, too slow to suppress a startle.

“I can’t believe you would take a punch for me,” Brian says into Pat’s shirt, and it’s low and reverent and Pat’s heart twists, twists, twists.

“For you and for me and for anyone else Driscoll is gonna tear through this semester,” Pat corrects, because letting the kid think he’s a saint is wrong.

Wrapping his arms around Brian’s bare back is also wrong. Letting his nose rest in the kid’s soft hair is definitely wrong. It’s wrong to stroke down the knobs of his spine, and it’s wrong to listen to his shuddering breaths, and it’s wrong to breathe in his scent—

it’s wrong to even _think_ about the scent of a cherubic little freshman like that—

it’s wrong, wrong, wrong, and Pat does it anyway, because tequila makes him _weak._

They’re like that for a few minutes, sitting on the floor behind the counter, holding each other, and Pat’s brain is just quiet. Later, he can think about the hundred thousand ways he’s fucked up today, not least of which that his hand is cradling Brian’s neck and brushing gently at the soft hairs at the nape—

_you’re a fucking sick son of a bitch Patrick—_

_—_ but for now, Brian’s breathing is growing steady again.

* * *

After the fiasco with Driscoll, Pat figure he’ll be stuck working register all term, but Brian rebounds the very next shift.

“I’ll take front again,” he says nonchalantly.

“You sure, kid?” Pat raises an eyebrow.

“It’s fine,” Brian shrugs. “You like being out back. I like making drinks.”

It _is_ fine. Pat works out back, and likes the solitude even when the night is fucking icy. When they have no customers he comes and lurks in the kitchen, playing DotA in the corner while Brian tries out new espresso-milkshake concoctions and sings improvised songs.

As a rule Brian works hard, which Pat doesn’t approve of. But he also makes dope-ass fusion quesadillas, and texts all his theater geek friends to come sneak leftover smoothies at the end of the night. The kid is growing on him. Too much, probably.

The first few shifts back, Pat hovers a little, but Brian doesn’t falter. He hollers out orders cheerfully, and never forgets what a macchiato is or complains about scooping out rock-hard ice cream twelve times for a whole fucking crew of giggling sorority girls.

By about 2am it’s always quiet, though. Pat’ll be on register, then. When the nerds stop by on their way back to the library and want a double redeye in a togo cup or a bag of black tea, he can handle that. Brian is long gone by that time—perched on a stool, head propped up on his hand, micronapping every time the music hits a ballad. At first, Pat figured Brian was just an early riser. Some people are like that. Start getting tired before midnight, wake up at 6am on the dot. Not a big deal.

But Brian’s got reasons to be tired, Pat finds out, when he walks in one Monday night, frazzled and sloppy in a corporate polo, and Pat cracks a joke about him fucking a girl who works at Chipotle.

“I don’t fuck girls,” Brian says with a quick smile—

Pat’s stomach does a _profound_ flip at this—

such a big flip it almost distracts his brain from the flash of weird _panic_ in the kid’s face, like he’s deployed this fiendishly well-timed bombshell to distract from something he’s terrified to discuss. _Fuck_ he’s quick.

“Their loss. Sorry, kid, didn’t mean to pry. None of my business who you fuck.”

Brian closes his eyes for a half-second. He looks like he’s recalibrating something. “Uh, no, it’s fine. I mean. There’s no good gossip. About who I’m fucking. No Chipotle girls. Or boys. I just work there a couple shifts a week, is all.”

Pat shrugs. “Didn’t think freshies were allowed to work off-campus.”

Brian smiles a little. “They aren’t. Uh, so keep it on the DL for me, please.”

Hmm. Maybe Brian’s just stressed about bureaucracy. “Ah. Way to stick it to the man, Gilbert. Working _secret jobs_.”

“What can I say,” Brian gives a weird smile. “Rebel to the core.”

There’s a pause, and Pat thinks that Brian would probably rather the conversation continue on to something else. But as they’re setting up, he can’t help but pick at it.

“Why risk the trouble?”

“I _really_ can’t afford this place,” Brian laughs lightly.

Pat snorts. “I feel you. But no matter how many times I tell that to Beth she never seems to cut me any slack.”

Brian smiles at that, a _real_ smile, and relaxes a modicum, because knowing the stone-faced bursar’s chilly smack-downs are a badge of secret camaraderie between the few students who have to ever think about affording this goddamn school. “I get a little. I’m cuter than you. I got special permission for the work-study, to make it all fit. As long as I keep up my grades.”

“Fuck, man,” Pat says, involuntarily. “What happens if you don’t?”

“Plan B is start murdering rich uncles,” Brian says distantly, “which I don’t have. Beth doesn’t know that yet.”

It makes sense, now, the fucking bags under this kid’s eyes. He’s pulling night shifts at caf and then shoving in weekend doubles in fast food—around a full load of classes—classes he actually _goes to_. Brian’s in organic chemistry, Pat realizes one day, when he comes in from the grill and the kid is sleeping soundly on a book of arcane squiggles. It’s a junior-level class, Pat’s pretty sure, but this fucking doe-eyed freshman is sleeping on an orgo book at 2am and a pile of morons are standing behind the counter pointing at him and giggling and probably contemplating covering his face with _something_ or other.

Pat shoves their food at them and chases them off, and if he spits in their fucking smoothies Brian’s not awake to chide him for it.

* * *

Pat tries, he _tries_ to shove down the dark and wicked part of himself that’s interested in this kid. But once you’ve broken the seal on something like that, it’s hard to muscle it back together. And Patrick’s self-control doesn’t get a lot of exercise, okay.

It’s not like anyone else seems to have any boundaries around Brian, either. His friends—theater kids and dance nerds and other dorks in glasses and bright colors—are very _touchy_ , which means Pat tends to peace the fuck out when they drop by. They haven’t, as a matter of course, tried to hug the sharp-elbowed creep with a scraggly beard, but they look like they _might_. Something about the easy way they move their hands, how fast they flit from place to place. It makes Pat antsy.

At first Pat thinks that Brian must have a hell of a lot of friends, and he says so, but Brian just laughs and denies it with a little hand wave. _I’m just in a lot of clubs,_ he shrugs, and smiles in that impish way he does that makes Pat feel a little flutter of confusion. _I’ve probably been kicked out of more clubs than you’ve ever joined._

Pat snorts, because that wouldn’t be hard—he’s not in any clubs, although he guesses maybe the Marxist reading group is kind of a club, although they don’t have regular meeting times except _Tara’s in town and she’s holding so circle up_ and _Allegra’s so fucking pissed she’s going to transfer come talk her out of it_ and _oh god we’ve all got a phil paper due Monday fucking hell let’s get it done._

But maybe the kid doesn’t have such a wide friend circle, really.

“Look, asshole, I get that you’re besties or whatever but fucking _cut that shit out_ ,” Pat barks, as the wandering arms around Brian’s shoulders distract him into falling off the stage for the third time. “You’re losing him _money_ every time you lose him a match.”

The guy—a sophomore, maybe? Pat doesn’t know him—jerks away with a sullen _sorry_ and drifts off to spectate with the other assholes from a more respectable distance.

“Thanks,” Brian says, softly, brushing the ruffled strands out of his eyes.  

“Your friends are dicks,” Pat grunts in quiet response. “Can’t they respect a good hustle.”

“He’s not my friend,” Brian says absently, choosing dark Link for the next round. “I think he’s in Fletcher?”

Pat wants to say _if you don’t know him then why the fuck is he touching you—_

but shuts up, because Brian needs to concentrate and also, hell, Patrick’s the last fucking person who is qualified to deliver judgment on physical intimacy. Hugging and arm-touching and hair-ruffling and eye contact and all that shit makes his skin crawl even when it’s with people he likes. Simone drives him up the fuckin’ wall. Other people probably don’t feel such strong repulsion toward human skin.

Except—

well, he finds he’d really like to touch Brian. His fingers itch for it, tremble with interest whenever he brushes up close. The kid is bold, intimate, effortless in his movements in that dancery way that makes Pat vaguely terrified. One minute he’s halfway across the room, the next he’s clambering through Pat’s personal space looking for extra straws, or shoving Pat over to make room in the booth for himself, or yanking out Pat’s earbud to ask him a question and then carefully, delicately brushing away Pat’s hair to fit it back in.

Pat’s ears _burn_ with embarrassment whenever he’s the recipient of these wayward little touches. He knows they’re not _special_. The kid’s not fucking _flirting_. He’s just a physical little being. Like Simone. It doesn’t mean anything. But look, Pat’s not got a lot of people who touch his face. Who brush against his waist to wriggle past him. Who tug his wrist and make him open his palm.

“See, there’s no muscles in the fingers—” Brian explains, touching gently to illustrate, and he’s talking about tendons and abduction and adduction as if Pat has _any_ fucking chance of listening, while his hand is in Brian’s delicate grasp. The kid hopefully can’t feel the fucking goosebumps that just cropped up on his body—if he does, though, he’ll probably just cheerfully explain the physiological mechanism behind _them_ , too—perhaps brush the back of Pat’s neck with his slim cool fingertips to illustrate—

Jesus fuck he is too old for accidental boners. God. Fucking. Damn. It.

He really needs to make this stop. He could do it, too. Just lose his temper _once_ about it—tell the kid off, nice and shouty—Brian'd never make this mistake again. It seems too mean, though, to make him upset about something that’s _Pat’s_ problem. Little wretch wouldn’t recover for weeks.

Also, Pat finds he doesn’t want the touching to stop. This is going to end in disast—

“Is this bad?” Brian hesitates, when his fingers are in the crook of Pat’s elbow. “Too boring?”

“No, no, I’m listening,” Pat lies and tries not to breathe too much or too little. “ _Extensor digitorum,_ I got it.”

Brian laughs. “It _is_ boring. You can just say it. I’m just using you to practice for my anatomy quiz.” He doesn’t fucking let go of Pat’s forearm, though. “You really have some crazy veins.”

“Yeah,” Pat says, fucking _stupidly_ , because he should make a joke or something, but the part of his brain does that is offline right now. Fingertips are ghosting down his skin and the bluish veins beneath. Brian’s _examining_ him with interest, like Pat’s a fucking animal pinned down for dissection, and he simultaneously wants to shake the kid off and go crawl in a hole, and wants this to never, ever, ever stop.

“I bet nurses love you,” Brian says thoughtfully, pressing two fingertips to Pat’s wrist to take a pulse.

“I get compliments, yeah,” Pat grunts, and hopes his voice doesn’t sound like he’s in _agony_.

Brian frowns a little. “Your pulse is really fast, Pat.”

There’s literally nothing Pat can say to this that’s not incriminating, so he just raises an eyebrow.

“I’d think you’d run slow. You’re so fit.” the kid glances up at him through his eyelashes and dear _god,_ there’s no way he can’t feel that, the way he makes Pat’s heart jump. This is more revealing than a fucking polygraph. “What’s normal for you?”

“No idea,” Pat lies, and Brian moves his other hand to the pulse point on Pat’s neck. The kid’s a little high, because Simone dropped by, which makes him flushy and impulsive and touchy and _beautiful_ —

 _fuck_ —

and now he’s staring up into Pat’s face with an expression of interested concern and big wide pupils and his gentle fingers pressing into Pat’s neck—like some underground telegraph operator, searching for the Morse code that his enemy heart is beating out—unshelving secrets and dumping them out into pulsing throbs for the this clever little spy to interpret.

“That’s like, more than a hundred beats per minute,” the kid breathes. “Are you okay?”

“What’re you, a premed?” Pat murmurs, somewhat strangled, pinned between the hand on his forearm and the hand on his neck and the gentle thoughtful tenderness as Brian bites his lip in sweet concern. This isn’t okay, it isn’t okay, for him to think these things, when the kid’s floating on a nice indica blend and just innocently stumbling into Pat’s wicked fantasies, and there’s nothing he wants more than to _slam_ into that little agile body and show him exactly what he’s worked up all this adrenaline for. “I just get anxious when people touch me, kid,” he says, which is not a lie.

But it is a _terrible_ truth, because it makes Brian draw away immediately and apologize. “Sorry, sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Pat says tightly, because he can still feel the echoes of those fingers on his neck like a brand, for all the rest of the long night.  


	3. the losing game

###  ** round 3. the losing game. **

a chess variant in which the objective is to lose all your pieces or be stalemated first.   
capturing is compulsory, though players may choose which capture to make if many are available.

* * *

It’s December—finals week—when things come apart at the seams.

Pat’s not overbooked, actually. He’s got papers, of course, but he always has papers, and papers compress to fill the time available. Even the gen ed classes he’s put off aren’t that bad, ‘cause Brian talked him into transferring out of Geo101 and into ethology.

 _Brian, I don’t even know what the fuck that is_ , Pat grumbled. But Brian was insistent—maybe sick of Patrick’s endless bitching about the rocks-for-jocks crowd. _I’m too stupid for science, anyhow._

 _Shut up! That’s a dumb thing to say._ Brian was up and moving—so _animated_ by how good an idea he’d had, by the conviction that he could fix this problem for Patrick—so enthused that he forgot to dip his chin and be polite and nervous and soft-spoken and instead let himself be tactless and pushy-bold. Pat couldn’t help smiling, when the kid scowled at him. _You already know you hate that class, why not at least try something new? I swear you’ll like it. The prof is awesome._

It’s not a popular class, even though it’s an intro science, and Pat nearly bolted when he stuck his head in and found an old professor with a _slide projector_ lecturing a tiny crew of maybe seven students. But it was too goddamn awkward to leave, so he just settled down in the back and prepared to get some fodder to bitch at Brian about later.

Ethology turned out to be a biology kinda thing. It was a dull, dimly-lit hour of droning, but despite himself, Patrick learned some shit. That the ketchup-red dots he’d always wondered about on seagull beaks were signals to their babies. That owl ears are asymmetrical so they have a 3D world of sound. That it’s not just philosophy profs who wax poetic about the _umwelt_ and other weird German shit. That this class—

wait _really_? One lab, and one paper, and that’s _it?—_

He had the ancient bearded professor sign his add slip at the end of the period. When he told Brian, the kid at least had the decency not to look too smug.

So Pat’s sitting pretty on at least one fucking A this quarter, and while everyone else is cramming about igneous formations or whatever he gets to enjoy the leisurely finals-week excursion to the owl lab. It’s sick as fuck. A real Harry-Potter-ass kinda place, buried deep like a dungeon below the biology building, with double-locked doors and a long twisting hallway and confusing signage so the _PETA_ people can’t find it. Pat feels sorry for the birds—some of ‘em are wearing little metal yarmulkes bristling with embedded electrodes—but since they perch on his professor’s arm with real affection as soon as he walks in, they probably don’t have it so bad. Who’s Pat to judge. Maybe a little invasive surgery is a worthy trade, to nuzzle Dr. Garcia’s hand and get scratches under their creamy feathered chins.

* * *

But just ‘cause Pat’s having an easy time of it doesn’t mean finals week isn’t hell, in general. Caf is a shitshow. Everyone’s staying up, pulling all-nighters, coming by for pickmeups and camping out all night long with flashcards. The nights drag on even longer than usual, and there’s rarely a pause. Brian’s got the worse end of it, on front. His fingers are never still; the poor bastard is foaming and flipping all night without so much as a minute to sit down.

He looks _dead,_ Pat realizes as he comes in with the final basket of wings and declares loudly to the room that the fryer is closing for the night, no last-minute orders, _too bad fuckers, you missed it, I’m sick of your shit, pack it the fuck up and get lost._

Brian doesn’t even protest at his rudeness. Even though it’s nearly an hour early to close, and Pat is full-on shooing people out the door with his spatula. _Sorry assholes. Closing time. Your calorie tracker will thank me._

The kid just ignores him, leans over the sink, resting his hands on it. It looks like staying upright is a real challenge.

“Let me wash up,” Pat says, because it really doesn’t fucking look like Brian even remembers how sinks work—or maybe he’s just trying to figure out if he can simultaneously wash cutlery and take a power nap. The kid nearly rubs his eyes with a hand holding a fork, and Pat has to pluck it out of his fingers so he doesn’t stab his stupid self. “Go take it easy. I got this.”

He doesn’t protest, just lets himself be jostled out of the way, heads out into the now-empty café and curls up in a booth like an overlarge cat while Pat fills the sink with hot soapy water. It doesn’t take much cleaning, really—wash a few utensils, wring out a few dishrags. They’re faster when they do it together, but not by much, because Pat’s usually out sneaking a cigarette when he’s supposed to be taking out the trash.

This time, though, he puts things away as efficiently as he can. He wants to check on Brian, and if he’s quick then he can do it before Luis shows up to sign them out. When he gets over to the booth the kid is dead to the world, taking great shuddering breaths in his slumber like a drowning man.

Pat is tired, too, and a bit stoned, and lets himself put a hand in Brian’s hair. He feels oddly protective of this little creature, who certainly hasn’t skipped any shifts this week, despite his scattered monologues about needing to study. For his impossible exams. Which he has to pass because if he fails them they’ll kick him out of his goddamn workstudy. And that’ll send him home, most likely, ‘cause his family loves him but they can’t help that much. And it’d be fine to go home. Community college is fine. Living with your parents is fine. Failing is fine. But he’d hate for all the money he’s earned and saved and spent on this place to be an utter _waste_.

He’s been talking about it, when he’s too tired to hold back the tears.

The bags under his eyes are spectacular right now. Blue and green and almost _tangible_. He looks waiflike, curled up on the wooden booth, slim wrist dangling toward the floor, a crumpled marionette who’s been bashed to uselessness.

 _This is going to be a problem_ , the voice says in Pat’s head, as his eyes flit again over the limp body. He’d like to pretend his gaze is chivalric, protective. But it’s not. It’s just not. _It’s already a problem._

“Yeah,” says Pat to no one. “Fuck it.”

Brian isn’t very hard to pick up. He stirs a bit but not much, lets himself be lifted without even a murmur.

Pat nods to Luis on the way out, who tips his hat silently.

Pat kind of knows where Brian lives—he knows the dorm at least, and it wouldn’t be hard to ask which room—but he hesitates. Carrying the limp body of a freshman into Lemelson at 3am wouldn’t go unnoticed. They would probably freak out and call campus security. He’d probably have to wake Brian, to sort the mess out. And that’d be a shame.

Instead, Pat heads to his place, even though it’s off-campus and his arms get tired somewhere past the computer science building.

He runs into no one along the way, and he’s glad, because he has no cover story whatsoever.

His roommates are asleep, and although he could probably just drop Brian on the couch, it’s a really dogshit one. A hand-me-down many-times-over with loose springs and peeling faux leather. Plus, then his roommates will _definitely_ see the kid when they get up, and he’d hate to put Brian in a position to field those kinda questions. So it’d be better—

 _You’re a real piece of work, Patrick,_ his mind supplies, archly, as he steps carefully over the mess and into his tiny single bedroom, depositing the sleeping Brian on his own unmade but at least reasonably clean bed.

Brian murmurs something, but Pat can’t tell whether it’s an actual sentient thought or not. Hopefully not a protest, but it’s not likely. He’s out. Pat just flicks off the lights. It’s better if he can’t clearly see the slender limbs stretching out over his sheets.

He’s not going to undress the kid—his depravity has _some_ limit, it seems—but he does pull off the ratty shoes and slip the smudged glasses off his face. He thinks about fishing for a phone to see if he can charge it. But groping in the kid’s pockets would be just…too much, that’s too much.

“Bri,” Pat whispers, close to Brian’s ear. “What time do you have to wake up tomorrow?”

He has to ask twice more before he can break the kid out of REM. “…six…”

“Like hell. When’s your next exam.”

“Nine,” Brian mumbles, and Pat sets an alarm for 8:45.

His brain is too loose to justify it to himself as he pulls out his spare blanket and curls up on the floor. The sofa is out there, but—the _questions_ —he pushes shut his door and lets himself fall asleep to the sound of Brian’s breathing.

* * *

_BEEP BEEP BEEP_

_Not my alarm_ , Pat’s brain registers for one second before his face is stepped on.

“Fuck!” Pat jerks awake, and the foot jerks up too.

“Sorry!” A squeak. Unnecessary, the kid hadn’t really put any weight down—just enough to startle. Pat props himself up on his elbow to assess the situation.

“P-pat? Why are you on the floor?” It’s never very dark in Pat’s room, with the street light outside, and he can clearly see Brian’s face fighting to portray terror and exhaustion in one expression.

“Because you’re in my bed,” Pat grouses, “And the sofa hurts my back. Go back to sleep.”

Brian is orienting himself, and the immediate scared look of waking up in a strange place is fading, for the more tempered scared look of final exams on the horizon. “I can’t—I’ve got to—go to the library—”

“Shut the fuck up,” Pat growls, because he’s _unbelievable_. Christ. “It’s three hours before your first exam, and you’re not fucking traipsing off to study on two hours of sleep. I can leave, if it weirds you out that I’m on the floor. But you’re going to sleep.”

“It doesn’t…weird me out…” Brian is still struggling muzzily to find words, but he’s also struggling to sit up and struggling to look around, possibly for his shoes. “But…”

“I’m not fucking joking, Brian. I’m not letting you out of here.”

“I can’t—I’m not—your bed—”

_BEEP BEEP BEEP_

“Who has a goddamn _two minute_ snooze button, Brian?!” Pat lunges for the offending phone, wrestling it from the kid’s hand and hitting the off button resolutely. He’s only in Brian’s personal space for a second—

or only plans to be, but the kid grabs his shirt—

and Pat freezes because the stare he is getting has an intensity that is unfamiliar in Brian’s face.

 _He’s probably fucking terrified of you_ , _you freak. You put him in your bed, you just grabbed his phone, and you’re not letting him leave._

Pat lets out a breath, and tries not to look like the kind of person he is. “Kid, you can have your phone back,” he says softly. “But you can’t set an alarm. You can silence it and I can leave, or you can use it to call campus security and I’ll go quietly, but no alarms. Please.”

Brian is still just staring, though, and not letting go, and Pat is a little afraid he’s going to choose option B, but then he rasps. “Don’t leave.”

A wave of relief washes over Pat’s body. “Okay. You’ll sleep? Just until your first exam. I set an alarm. You won’t miss it. I promise.”

“Okay,” Brian says, “but you should have your bed.” Pat opens his mouth to say _you need it more than I do, kid,_ until he realizes that Brian isn’t getting out, just turning on his side, scooching over close to the wall, and making room for Pat beside him.

 _You’re going to hell,_ Pat thinks, as he climbs into the extra-long twin bed, and observes that they only both fit by spooning—it’s not going to work side-by-side, or even back to back, not really.

_Ever the opportunist, Patrick. Smell a hint of blood in the water and there you are._

“Thank you,” Brian sighs as Pat wraps an arm around him, cementing his fate in eternal damnation for ever and ever, amen.

* * *

_BRRRR BRRR BRRRRRRRRRRRRR_

It’s a moment later, it seems, when there’s a hand fighting Pat for his phone. Brian’s hand. To turn off the alarm. Brian’s leaving, scrambling to get his things together, stammering whatever bullshit in his haste to get the fuck out. Understandable.

Pat just says “Seeya,” and rolls over, cheeks burning with heat. He doesn’t want to see Brian’s face on the way out, doesn’t want to hear the apologies or excuses or accusations or requests.

The kid goes. After a bit, shame loses the battle and Pat jerks off, coming quick with humiliation.

 _Fuck it._ Whatever the kid thinks, it can’t hurt him anymore. He’s only got two terms more, and then he’s free of that kind of shit. So what, what people say. It’s never bothered him before. Brian should know better than to start rumors, anyway. He’ll get it worse than Pat does. Everyone already knows Pat’s a Ridley senior, and a fucking asshole to boot, and him perving on a cute little Lem freshman will make them laugh, maybe—but it won’t surprise them.

But Brian probably won’t fuck with him too much. He’s too nice. And too busy.

Pat shoves himself up and over to his laptop. Checks the schedule. _Of course._ Of course Brian is covering Ari’s shift. They’re scheduled three nights a week, they’re not _supposed_ to work more than that, but Brian subs for Ari more often than not, _especially_ on the Friday shift ‘cause Ari’s never met a party he didn’t like, and Brian’s trying apparently to kill himself through sleep deprivation. This kid is just…he’s just…

Pat shoots Simone an email, and it’s pushier than it should be.

**Simone — I’m taking your shift tonight. Go study or party or whatever the fuck. You can bitch at me this weekend, but I’m doing it either way.**

It’s the wrong thing to do, Pat’s sure, Pat’s _sure_ , but when he goes back to sleep he sleeps peacefully.

* * *

“Sorry I’m late Simone—I’m the worst—I’ll do back tonight if you want—” he hears Brian call out, only ten minutes after start at most, for fuck’s sake.

Pat’s already got most stuff set up, shoving the empty propane tank back in the box and swapping for a new one. He finishes hooking it up and lights the pilot. It _woofs_ into flame after a few failed tries. Piece of trash.

“Simone? Are you mad— _Pat_?” Brian’s voice is surprised, but at least he doesn’t sound horrified, as he walks through the doorway onto the patio and is confronted with Patrick’s back stooped over the grill. “You never work Fridays.”

“Yeah, well.” Pat says, standing. “This week I’m personally devoted to making your life difficult.”

Brian gives a lopsided grin that could mean a lot of different things, possibly _you’re my friend okay but you have no right to be up in my shit like this_ or possibly _please leave me alone you creep_ or possibly _I have no idea what you’re talking about and it’s freaking me out._

“Look, kid,” his voice is gruff, because he wants to get it out. “Last night you let me bully you into sleeping, and tonight you’re going to let me do it again. You’re not working caf. Capiche?”

Brian looks heartbroken, but nods, his will crumbling under Pat’s stern glare. “I—I—”

“I know,” Pat says. “You need the cash. And fair enough. You’re signing in. You’re signing out. No one cares about the other shit. And I _might_ have nudged a camera or two so there’s nothing on the fucking record that nobody will ever check to get your little frosh ass in trouble. Okay?”

“You can’t—it’s just you, Pat—”

It’s too much, the look on Brian’s face. It’s just—with the tremor in his voice—it’s too much.

“Espresso machine’s down today, squirt.” Pat says blandly. “Grill is too. Weird coincidence.”

“Pat—”

“Fryer and a couple of milkshakes, I can handle. Plus when I’m on register we never get as many orders. Funny how that happens. Okay?”

Brian is staring at him, again with that intensity, that completely frank and earnest and _incomprehensible_ look that simply _must_ mean that Pat has gone too far, that he’s going to tell Pat to get the fuck away from him forever. And yet…

“Can I sleep at your place?”

Pat blinks.

“Yeah. You know how to find it?”

“202 Chesapeake,” Brian recites. “What’s the passcode?”

“Half-press six—you know how to do that? Good—full press 5 3 4.”

“Wake me when you get in,” Brian says, kisses him, and pushes off without another word.

Pat is so dazed all night that he even forgets to be mean to the custies. 

* * *

It isn’t much of a choice, whether or not to wake Brian, when he gets back in. He has to budge the kid to fit in the bed, and Brian’s sleeping heavy but not so heavy as all that.

“You’ve been smoking,” Brian murmurs against his chest.

“Yeah. Sorry for the smell.”

“I like it.”

“I’m a bad influence. You shouldn’t breathe that shit.”

Brian inhales deeply, as if defying his whispers.

“Why are you here, Brian?”

Brian shrugs, as much as one can, on one’s side in bed. “Why were you at caf tonight.”

“Because I care about whether or not you sleepwalk into traffic?”

“Same.”

Pat lets out a sigh. “Kid, don’t—it doesn’t—the metaphor doesn’t work—I’m the _traffic_.”

“Okay,” Brian says, and snuggles into Pat’s chest like a kitten.

 _I’m going to hell,_ Pat thinks, and when he hears it in the room he realizes it was out loud.

“I’m coming too,” says Brian, and falls asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> where i come from, we call this variant "suicide chess" rather than the losing game. i highly recommend it, it's very fun, and was much beloved by the third-graders who taught it to me.


	4. naka bid hang

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter contains quite explicit (consensual) sex.

###  ** round 4. naka bid hang. **

(serpent twists its tail) grab the opponent’s kick. twist.   
strike upward with knee into opponent’s knee or thigh.

* * *

Fucking Brian is incredible.

His sinful little face, tousled and red-cheeked and languid, tongue trailing up Pat’s chest, a shiny glint of saliva—his own or Pat’s, hard to tell—wet and hot at the edges of his pouty red mouth.

“You know what you do to me, kid,” Pat groans, as his mouth is captured in another kiss.

“What do you want me to do to you, Patrick,” Brian breathes on his cheek, licking at his stubble. “I’ll do it. You just might have to teach me how.”

Pat is nearly in tears. The innocence, the aggression. It’s all too much. It’s like this kid has swallowed a transcript to a porno. One that Pat will never admit jerking off to, but it doesn’t matter what he admits. Not when Brian is so close, and so wild, and pulling up Pat’s hand to suck on his fingers wantonly.

“ _Jesus Christ_ in heaven above,” Pat swears, as his fingers are forced up to tickle the back of Brian’s throat. It’s so much. It’s too much. _Certainly_ too much for a fucking bathroom stall.

His brain can’t fucking concentrate to slow this down, though, when the kid is pulling his fingers, dipping their hands together below the waist of Brian’s unbuckled jeans.

“You can make me come in my pants, if you want,” Brian’s voice is— _fuck_ —breathy, teasing, floaty, drawling, feather-soft and rasping-wicked and everything sinful and beautiful at once—

Pat doesn’t respond to this, except to grab Brian’s ass in a firm hand, squeeze hard. _Fuck_.

“You don’t even have to touch me. You can fuck my ass if you want. With your dick. Your fingers. With anything. You can make me squeal.”

“ _Jesus_ ,” Pat can see it, the kid riding his dick with abandon, pinned against the dingy stall door, choked sounds of pleasure echoing around the tile. “You can’t be real.”

“I’m whatever you want,” Brian says, and Pat feels a twinge of hesitation before he can’t think anymore, because the kid is grabbing his dick, and it’s. fucking. _impossible_.

* * *

Once he realizes Brian is going to keep inviting himself back to Pat’s room, Patrick indulges his own desires a little more vigorously. If you’re going to town, you might as well go in a Lincoln.

The kid is brilliantly reactive—how he moans and writhes—and whines and pleads for more. It’s shameful, how much Pat likes leaving dark hickies on his collarbone, how pleased he is when his groping elicits those sweet little innocent squeaks, how Brian grinds down on his probing fingers and Pat feels inclined to tease and tease him until he’s begging obscenely.

“Please, Patrick, _please_ ,” the little thready voice begs, quite unraveled. Brian tries to twist back to look up, but it’s gotta be tough, with his hips pinned by Pat’s to the edge of the desk and the hand on the small of his back. “Stop _teasing_ me.”

It feels so good, to press down, to grind hungrily, to taunt. “Why _should_ I, kid. Three fingers aren’t enough?”

“Nooo,” he whines. “C’mon, Pat, c’mon. I’ll—” he loves that little breathy pause, as Brian tries to think of what to bargain with, what he could do that he hasn’t already done. He gives up with a whiny moan “—I’ll be good.”

Pat has no doubt he’ll try, but he loves listening to him hiss and sob and beg for cock. It’s _unearthly_ , the way he keens and squirms and promises Patrick the world.

“Gotta be more specific than that, Bri. What do you want, exactly?”

“ _Fuck_ me,” Brian gasps and bucks. “Let me flip over—I’ll get up on the desk—you’ll really like it—”

God. There’s nothing better than Brian’s commitment to acrobatics. Pat relents, and Brian hops his ass up on Pat’s desk. He’s all hot sweaty palms and gangling limbs, reaching out, drawing recklessly close and trying to thread himself around Pat and fit them back together.

“Whoa, _whoa_ , take it easy,” Pat says, without the courage of conviction, because he finds it _unutterably_ sexy, how this kid moves fast and flirty and determined. Like he’s somehow a perfect vision of chaotic impulsiveness and also he’s planned this all out down to the last centimeter. It’s hard to keep up— well, more accurately, it’s hard to _not_ keep up—because Brian’s pulling with a burning hand on Pat’s ribcage and his legs are curling around Pat’s waist and he’s guiding Pat back inside him with a little grunt of shameless satisfaction.

“This can’t be comfortable,” Pat gasps, trying to find a place for his fingers on Brian’s back, to stop the desk from pressing into his vertebrae.

“No, no, it’s good,” Brian pants. “Once you’ve— _there_ —” he seats himself, locking his ankles together, “—I can do _this_ —” He leans back, then, lifts himself, so his weight is split between his own palms flat on the desk just behind him and Pat’s hips.

This— _God_ —

with his hands busy holding himself up—

he’s _utterly_ at Pat’s mercy, head thrown back wantonly, bare chest sweaty and on display out in all its red-marked glory.

“Fuck me,” the kid whispers, and holds himself just so, arms trembling a little with the effort of being so fucking beautiful. Pat can’t help but obey, to thrust up hard into those delicate hips and watch in sinful pleasure as this little libertine jerks and keens. His own hairy dark forearms are a delicious contrast where they wrap tight around the pale porcelain of Brian’s waist—the hungry unbridled sounds he makes shut out all other hearing—the sights and sounds and taste of sweat and all of it— _Jesus Christ_ , the ideas in this kid’s head. Pat has never, not ever, had sex like this.

* * *

They keep things quiet, at first. It’s Pat’s idea. He doesn’t want to blow up the kid’s spot. He knows how Lemelson can be. Prudish. Judgy.

_And it gives you a little thrill, to sneak around, doesn’t it?_

The Lems wouldn’t take it well. Pat’s already got a reputation over there, because of how he broke up with Roy—his shitheel behavior’s the stuff of legends by now. Surely the kid already knows. But better he not have to explain his asshole fuckbuddy to all his little friends.

And if he doesn’t know...

well, Pat’s none too eager to bring it up.

The secrecy suits Pat just fine. It’s a kind of heaven, working at the caf like always, playing silly games and shooting the shit, scaring off custies and getting a scolding for it, then closing up and rambling over to Pat’s together in the darkness. Brian’s always dog-tired, but chock-full of strange energy—like Pat’s touch is caffeine, and he’s thrumming with paradoxical wakefulness. Like he needs to drink in the whole world tonight, tonight, before it’s gone.

The kid crawls all over him as they traverse the empty campus, reveling in giggles and sighing adorably whenever Pat tucks him under an arm. Bri always wants to take Pat straight home and jump his bones, with a skill that is unholy and a vigor that is unparalleled in all of Pat’s sexual experience, real and imagined. Pat loves it—fucking _loves_ it—

but he also loves the walks in the pre-dawn darkness. He loves just...just being, when there’s no one there to see and the campus is quiet and Brian’s skin is yellow-gold in the streetlights when he looks up at Pat with sleepy adoration.

So Pat pushes them to take more detours, and Brian seems happy enough with the idea. They wander up the street to get late-night boba. Brian lets him in the biology building—the one you need two keys for—to show him the rats and the preserved brains. Pat teaches him where you can climb on the dumpster to reach the fire escape, and sneak up to the roof of the old math building, and let your feet hang down. Brian loves it, the first time—

but misses the grab the next time they go—

and it’s 3.30 AM and Pat’s a little drunk and one of the things he cares about most in the universe goes plummeting to the ground and lands with a strangled scream on the concrete.

Pat’s there in a second, hands on the little shaking shoulders.

“You’re okay, you’re okay,” he mutters, more to reassure himself than the kid, who after his exclamation of pain looks fine, almost sheepish.

“I’m fine—I’m _fine_ Pat—just—scared me—that’s all—”

“Bullshit,” Pat grunts, hands feeling over his body, looking for the lie.

“Naw,” Brian shrugs, smiling in embarrassment. “I overreacted. Nothing. See?”

There doesn’t seem to be much damage—the elbow is scraped, the ankle’s probably a bruise—but Pat’s heart pounds nonetheless. That shriek tore something open in him, and he wants to pick the kid up and carry him home right away, and kiss him until he knows to never make that sound again, not while Pat’s within hearing.

“Let’s go get this cleaned up,” Pat says, holding his arm, which is a little silly because it’s just skinned, but he can’t fucking _help_ it.

“No,” Brian pouts. “I want to try again.”

“Like hell.” Pat scowls. “You’re not doing that again.”

“I’ll make it this time.”

“If you crack your skull open—” Pat starts the sentence, and finishes it different than he intended, “I’ll go to jail for manslaughter. At least.”

“If you give me a boost I’ll get it,” Brian wheedles. “I feel silly for yelling.”

“Fuck your pride.” Pat says flatly. “I’ll carry you back if I have to.”

Brian grabs his shirt, kisses right onto his frowning face. “Pleaaaaase. I really want to kiss you under the moon tonight. Please? It doesn’t even hurt.” He wiggles his ankle. “See? I’m sorry I scared you. I’m a screamer. Let me try.”

Pat can’t resist. He can’t ever. “Fine. But no more fucking jumping until I teach you how to shoulder roll. I’ll go first, and I can yank you up. That way if I end up in jail it’s my own fucking fault.”

Brian acquiesces to this plan, with only the slightest suggestion of favoring his ankle, so they climb back up the dumpster. Pat makes his leap, wraps his legs, and hangs out a forearm to grab Brian firmly.

“Okay, kid. I’m pulling you hard on three. Grab onto the ladder or me, whatever you please, just fucking grab something.”

They make it up there that night, but not until after four, and kissing takes so long to calm down Pat’s heart that they decide to watch the sunrise. It’s beautiful, how Brian's drooping head goes from sweetly tired in grey and yellow-red to sleeping sound on Pat’s lap in pink and morning blue. But nothing gold can stay.

“Kid, kid. We gotta get down. People’ll start waking up, soon. We can’t be up here.”

“ ‘Kay,” Brian rouses himself. Pat stands, brushes himself off, takes a last look at the horizon. It’s gonna be a clear day, seems like. Then, there’s a sound—

it’s not quite like before—

but it’s similar enough to make Pat whip around. His heart jumps, to see the kid on all fours, breathing hard.

“ _Fuck_ , Pat.”

Pat’s touching Brian again, the same way, fingers feeling all over, looking for something. As if he could even feel what was wrong. As if his hands would stick like a magnet to it, the burn of muscles or the rip of tendons or the throb of heartache burning through skin.

“What is it. What’s wrong.”

“I think I—I didn’t realize—” Brian scowls, like a stubborn child trying to put a brave face on it, and shoves himself up. The squeak, for the third time, is too fucking much—his leg buckles beneath him, outside of his control. Pat catches him this time, at least.

“Fucking _shit_ , kid, you said you were _fine_.”

“I thought I was,” Brian pants. “But now I—can’t put weight on it, Pat. Can’t at _all_. Why—” He looks so confused. “—why didn’t it hurt like this before? I thought I—I thought it was bad when I landed. It hurt a lot, but then it was pretty much fine? I thought I was just being a baby.”

“ _Shit_ ,” Pat rubs his face. “You sprained it. That was adrenaline, you little idiot, and now I’ve let you dangle it off the edge of a building all morning instead of icing it. Fuck. It’s swollen to hell.”

“I can’t walk, Pat,” says his small, forlorn voice.

“No shit.” Pat presses his hand into his forehead. “Well. We have a couple of options. D’you trust me to carry you down, or should I call security?”

“I trust you,” he says immediately.

“Well, _hell_ , kid.” Pat runs a hand through his hair. “At least _think_ about it for a second. If I drop you your shit is double-fucked.”

“I already know you can carry me.”

It fights, the cold anxiety, with the warmth of Brian’s trusting gaze. Fucking hell.

“Plus, Pat, you have a lot of incentive.” He smirks, just a little, around the pain. “To not do jail time.”

Pat snorts, despite himself. “ _Jesus_ , kid. How I get myself into these messes. Fuck. All right. How you want to be carried? Fireman, or you want to monkey yourself on my back.”

“You pick. You have to do the work.”

He tries both. Brian can’t lock his ankles around Pat’s waist, not without screaming, and Pat’s not confident with the kid on his back otherwise. He could easily slip down Pat’s hips, while his hands are doing something else. “Fireman it is. All right, kiddo. Try to fucking hang on. And preferably not to my neck.”

Brian’s surprisingly easy to hoist. He stays limp and pliant. He’s slim, too. It’s simple. Pat still has a moment of terror, on the edge of the rooftop. With his hands climbing, and the kid over his shoulders, things’ll be easy—unless they aren’t. And Pat has no way to catch him, if he shifts his weight. If the kid falls off here, six stories up, he’ll fucking _die_.

“New plan,” Pat says, shortly. “I’m putting you down. Look sharp.”

“Am I wiggling too much?” Brian says, as he’s eased back onto the concrete rooftop. “I can be still.”

“Not that. Your life is just flashing before my eyes, kid. Here’s how we’re going to do this. You’re gonna monkey yourself on my front, and I’ll hold you up. Like this.”

He gets it how he’s envisioning. The kid can’t lock his legs this way either, but he can squeeze his arms tight around Pat’s neck, and his knees around Pat’s hips, and Pat can wrap an arm around his ass, and it feels much better. Yeah, the kid might go plummeting to his death, but at least he’ll drag Pat along too, and then Pat won’t have any fucking explanations to deal with.

“You’re gonna climb with one arm?” Brian says, softly.

“It’s safer this way. I can rest if I need to. Or we can call security.”

“I trust you,” Brian says again, and snakes his hands around Pat tightly.

Pat climbs down, carefully, keeping the kid tight between his chest and the ladder, using the rungs to help with the weight. When they get to the bottom, Pat has a plan.

“Hold the fuck on, kid. There, you got it? Good. I’m jumping down now, then I’ll catch you.”

“How do you do that,” Brian sighs, when Pat jumps down and takes the impact on his shoulder, rolls up.

“Magic. Now, watch me catch you.”

This is the part he’s afraid of, actually. He thinks about warning the kid not to jump ankle-first, but decides against it. If the kid breaks his ankle that’s bad, but beats his skull. He’s a good ten feet off the ground, but at least it’s not a hundred.

“All right. I’ll go on three?”

“Good. Try to aim for me and not the asphalt this time, kid.”

“ ‘Kay. One. Two. Three.”

It’s not elegant, the way Pat snags him, with an _oof_ and a stumble and a hand around his back and his crotch. But it doesn’t hurt the kid’s ankle, and it doesn’t add too many new bruises, so it’s a win.

They’re both panting with exertion, and smiling in stupid idiocy at each other. It’s dawn in earnest, now.

“All right. Hard part’s over. Now I just carry your useless ass for a quarter mile,” Pat groans.

“I could prolly hop,” Brian says, uncertainly. “Or call someone to bring me a crutch.”

“Nah, fuck it. You’re not that heavy. Upsie-daisie.”

He hefts Brian in a fireman carry, ignoring any protests, and starts walking.

The kid laughs, goes limp obediently. “My hero. I owe you one.”

“You bet your sweet ass,” Pat grins.

* * *

Brian says he’ll get a friend to take him to the health center that morning, so Pat reluctantly leaves him in his bed, with an icepack and a jaunty smile. It goes fine, as far as Pat can tell, and when he gets back after class the kid has his crutches and a brace and some painkillers, and offers reassurances that it’s not too bad and he just needs to take it easy for a bit.

This is the best result that could be expected, or so Pat thinks, until two days later when he’s walking back from the Russian literature seminar he pretends to hate and something _slams_ him into a wall.

“What the _fuck_ , Gill.”

He winces, because he’d been expecting a punch, but this is worse. It’s Legs.

“Heya, Legs. How’s it hangin.”

“ _Not great_ Patrick. You’ve got some explaining to do, and you’d better do it quick.”

“All right.” He coughs, and decides to play dumb. “Just let up on the solarplexus, all right, and I’ll give it a shot.”

“What the _fuck_ are you playing at with Brian Gilbert.” Direct. He likes that about her.

“Pardon?”

“I’m not a fucking _moron_ , Pat. Kid called me at 8am this week, and he was _in your bed_ , and he needed crutches. What the fuck did you do to him?”

Pat’s disappointed that she thinks so little of him, but can’t say he’s really surprised. She’s smart, and she’s funny, but she’s a Lem senior and she knows what rumors about him are true.

“I’m not a mafia boss, Allegra, I didn’t break his fucking kneecaps. He fell, all right? We work caf together. I helped him get some ice in the middle of the night. He said he’d call a friend to get him to the doctor ‘cause I had a morning class. That’s it.”

“ _Bull-fucking-shit,_ ” she growls. “I know you, Gill, and I know your _type_. You’re not helping him out of the goodness of your heart.”

Pat raises an eyebrow, blandly. Might as well make her say it. Her face is furious and her nails are digging into his shirt like she’s really thinking about taking this conversation into a different medium, something a little more physical.

“You’re _fucking_ that kid, and it’s not right. You should be ashamed of yourself.”

He opens his hands in a gesture of _whatchoogonnado_ , neither admitting nor denying, neither confused nor contrite.

“So, are we done here, or…?”

She pauses a long moment, just glaring at him. Interesting, how pissed she is. They’re much the same height, really, and he’s not gonna fuckin’ fight back against Legs. He’s just a little surprised she’s this worked up. Sure, he’s a cradle-robbing sicko, but he didn’t know she’d take it so personal. It’s good, really, that she takes care of the kids in her house that well. The Lems don’t do that enough. She’s a good fucking friend.

“I _wish_ I could justify punching you,” she huffs. She really should have been in Ridley.

Pat sighs. “I’m sure someone could give you a reason.”

“ _Plenty_ of someones.” She lets him go, mastering her face. She likes him, actually, Pat thinks, which doesn’t make her particularly less mad, but it does mean she’s probably not gonna punch him until she knows for sure what an utter cock he is. “Why’d it have to be _him_ , Pat. He’s too fucking good for you. Leave him the hell alone.”

“Roger,” he says, grabbing his things and going, although of course he has no such intention.


	5. secret queen

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this chapter contains extensive, explicit discussion of drug use (LSD specifically) but can be skipped if that's not your thing.

###  ** round 5. secret queen.  **

a chess variant in which both players mark the bottom of pawn before play begins.   
throughout play, this pawn may move as a queen, but also must be protected as a royal piece.

* * *

_Something isn’t right_ , Pat thinks as he stares at Brian, for the third time in as many days.

This thought has come up before. Even before the fucking ankle. It’s just that every time he’s thought it, it’s been shoved straight out the window—caught under a falling chandelier—assassinated by a single sniper shot as soon as Brian gets Pat in his sights. Lifts his gaze. Catches Pat’s eye and soon after catches his lip or his wrist or his shirt, draws close, says something _outrageous_ under his breath, grinds up against him, tongues the skin, tilts his hips, cocks an eyebrow, brushes their bodies—

 _fuck_ , Patrick keeps falling for it, every goddamn time—

his stupid sex-drugged brain gets ensnared like a hapless rat. Brian’s lascivious and precise, brilliant, fast-thinking, fast-talking, perpetually horny and effortlessly sensual, like he’s a spy running a fucking honeypot and directing the conversation with his spit-slicked fingertips whenever it strays too far from government secrets.

So it’s been three days of this. And it’s only by chance—chance and the late hour, probably—that Brian hasn’t noticed Pat staring yet. Kid’s got a preternatural _awareness,_ a keen vibrating psychic knowledge that somewhere eyes are on him and therefore it’s time to shine. Thank god it’s offline for just half-a-sec so Pat can _think_.

Brian’s resting for the moment, finishing homework at the back of caf. His ankle’s propped up on the table at a rather obscene angle, knee bent. It looks so physically uncomfortable that Pat thinks it might actually contraindicate the doctor’s recommendation to _elevate for 2-3 hours a day_.

He looks so tired. Miserable, even. Like he’s got a big test coming up, and he knows he isn’t gonna pass it, but goddammit he’s decided to give it his all. Like he’s found out he’s been drafted and he ships off tomorrow. Like he’s in fucking _pain_.

Brian notices Pat’s stare. His face changes. Smooths over.

“What you lookin’ at, Patrick,” he says, coyly. He flips his hair. Instantly, instantly horny. _No one’s like that_. “Wanna come help me finish my notes?”

“Nah,” Pat shrugs. “I’m tired. Just gonna play DotA until it’s time to close up.”

Brian nods, and his face closes off. It’s impossible to tell whether he’s disappointed or relieved. “Lemme know if you change your mind.”

The kid watches Pat carefully, as he goes. As if waiting until the last second, staying ready, in case Pat _does_ change his mind. It’s too fucking ridiculous _._ The kid has a sprained ankle and a shitton of homework, and he never sleeps. How is he _like_ that. It’s a put-on. It must be. But _why_.

Pat thinks about asking Legs. This kind of stuff isn’t his strong suit. But he doesn’t know how she’d react, if he came to her for advice at all, let alone advice about his hot little piece of freshman ass, and why Brian wants to be fucked _so_ vigorously and _so_ often it really barely stands to be believed.

No, that wouldn’t go over well. So he’s gotta approach this his own way.

* * *

Brian’s been begging him all winter to try acid.

It’s Pat’s own fault, really—he and Roach have too many goofy fun-sounding stories of tripping out in the woods—laughing like maniacs and chasing down faeries—playing old cassette tapes on Ari’s boombox like they fell into the seventies through a wormhole—cracking glowsticks and painting the sky with strange designs that linger _incredibly_ long in the darkness—like time itself has slowed down—

(Brian interrupts that story to go research fucking _flicker-fusion thresholds_ or some other crazy vision science bullshit which is apparently related to alterations in time perception blah blah blah)

well, the kid’s a goody-two-shoes, but he’s also endlessly _curious_ , absorbs all of life with a frantic cheerfulness that suggests he’s afraid someone might take it away from him, if he doesn’t grab it quick. Pat’s never met anyone quite like him, actually. With his A+’s and his acrobatics, his meticulous attention to both the veracity of his time cards and to curating his talents at blowjobs. He’s sweet, and bold, and giggly, and insatiable, and wild, and smart, and he’s never dropped before, but he’s done his research, and he trusts Pat (god help him).

So Pat finally nails down a few tabs, even though Ari’s not holding and he has to go begging from that fucking asshole Franklin over in Fletcher. He wavers only for a second, really, about the whole plan, even though it’s probably the worst sin he’s committed yet—

(well, at least the worst sin in the past coupla weeks)

—but it’s worth it, it’s fucking _worth it_ , when he realizes—when the kid looks up and says shyly that it’d be fun, to drop together, just them two, if Pat doesn’t mind? It gives Pat all these fuckin’ goofy, floaty feelings that he thought he’d long left behind—

they bubble up in his chest, dislodging worthless, useless memories—

most of his happiest memories of this place are a little drug-addled—

Trav getting rowdy and tipping over the chessboard whenever Pat was gonna checkmate him—playing indoor boccie ball with Roy, right fucking _through_ Lemelson house—how hard the Ridley seniors all laughed when Pat blushed and copped to being _that kid_ —that brief period where Justin convinced everybody that smoke bombs were a perfect cover for a quick prank getaway—Ari dragging him along to crash faculty parties with a ridiculous cover story and a Goodwill blazer—Tara smiling at him, the very first time they met, and tipping his chin up and telling him he was a cutie, and he didn’t deserve it, and even if it he did, he’d fit in around here with all these other nasty fuckin’ cocksuckers.

Anyway. Yeah, he’s a right bastard, for getting the kid high. But Brian asks, so he does it.

* * *

Pat explains what the trip’s gonna be like with only a little judicious embellishment. _It’ll be chill,_ he assures Brian, while cueing up music and videos and games and a coupla other things he thinks the kid might like. Honestly, Pat’s not the _best_ companion for psychedelic wanderings. He’s too sullen-silent and dark. Gets in his own head too much. Simone’s way funnier. Justin’s way more chill. Ari’s the way to make sure you get a good fuckin’ story.

Pat’s not an instigator and he’s not a calming presence, either. He just knows how to maintain.

But he’s one of Ridley’s resident seniors now, so he’s got responsibilities. Simone spotted him using a computer while tripping balls last year—one of his few skills—he can touch-type, and he has his keyboard shortcuts, and even when the walls are melting he remembers his whole credit card number _and_ the security code _and_ he doesn’t get distracted by the very concept of a computer mouse and how strange it is that this small physical device’s limited hand-focused functionality defines the semiotic space of our entire existence in the virtual worlds we inhabit—

at least, he doesn’t get distracted for very long. The purchase doesn’t time out, that’s what’s important. So Pat takes care of juggling the playlists and finding the earbuds and checking the time without freaking out. He’s pretty good at not freaking out.

He’s got a good rhythm together. Act one, music, videos, nice and chill and colorful for the come-up, nothing heavy, nothing representational because although cartoons sound good in theory some people get wigged out by goofy violence.

Act two, get out. You’ll get claustrophobic, if you stay in one place for eight hours. They won’t feel like moving, but it’s time to go, and it’s Pat’s job to get them out the goddamn door. Everyone does their own thing, you can’t predict that. Some people just like to take a walk with their earbuds in and look forlornly at the closed-up morning glories. Some people wanna sneak into an empty lecture hall and fill the boards with doodles. Some people only make it as far as the front lawn, and just lie face-up on a beach blanket and look at the stars.

Act three, as soon as folks start to get antsy, come back to safety. Time for pillows on the floor and fuzzy blankets and breaking into the baked goods and trying to play games together and laughing your ass off. Simone runs that shit, because Pat’s not chatty enough—Pat just buys her whatever goofy stupid video game she’s decided they’re going to try this time and syncs it up with dark side of the moon and then takes a deep breath and wanders off to collect anyone who's not back safe and sound. It’s a bit of a journey, every time, but they haven’t lost a man yet.

Yeah, they know how to run a nice little trip. They’re not as good as Tara and Russ were, back in the day, but Simone’s the Ridley comptroller and Pat’s senior-vice-president- _propter_ -forced-abdication, and whatever their faults they have their duties. 

* * *

Pat and Brian sit around and chat and laugh and play cheap steam games—bashing on each other, hopping around, exploring dungeons—while they wait for the come-up. It’s fucking _nice_ , just being around the kid for a quiet minute for once, not working or sleeping or studying or fucking or anything like that.

Brian gets a little slow on the controller first, and when his character lags behind Pat stops to look at him. Realizes he’s got his own pleasant lightheadedness going too.

“C’mon,” he gets up suddenly, and sticks out a hand. “Let’s go watch something in my room.”

The kid’s a bit floaty, so Pat grabs his wrist and ushers him back. He puts on the cheeriest happiest Australian electronica album he’s got—seems Brian’s style—something that they can mostly ignore, but when your brain tunes into it it’ll just be a synth and a backbeat and a friendly voice chanting about ice cream and sunny summer love.

Brian stares at the ceiling for a long time and, when prompted, narrates what he sees. It has a distinctly aquatic flavor to it. Pat’s also a fan of stucco patterns, but they’re always more geometric to him. It’s interesting, how the kid waves his hand and oohs and aahs at the bright corals and little flitting fish. So fuckin’ _creative_.

“You wanna take a walk?” Pat offers, when they’re well and truly up, and Brian looks tentative but nods yes.

They walk, hand-in-hand, not talking, all around the neighborhood next to campus, where the houses are bright and big and beautiful and most people haven’t taken down their Christmas lights yet. It’s fun, to feel the kid’s hand tense with joy when he spots a particularly ridiculous display, to console him when he jumps at a sudden noise.

It’s three AM, and Brian wants to walk down the middle of the road because there’s no cars for miles. Pat tricks him into staying on the sidewalk by making a game of stepping on cracks. They don’t think too much, except about where each next footfall is going to land.

When Brian gets cold, they head back.

* * *

“Can I ask you a question.”

“Of course,” Brian says, voice light and airy. He’s on his back on the bed, buffered by pillows. Pat’ll join him, soon, hold him as close as he wants to be held, but he’s gotta get this fuckin’ music going first and he forgot what he named the goddamn playlist with only the cheery parts of the Braid soundtrack.

“Not that I don’t appreciate it, but why’re you always _so_ raring to go? To fuck, I mean. It seems like you push yourself.”

The kid’s body tightens up so hard that Pat might as well have hit him.

“Hey, hey, easy. Sorry. Nevermind—”

“It’s fine!” Brian is rigid as a board though, still staring at the ceiling but now breathing in a short, panicky, fucked-up way.

“Seriously, kid, nevermind. Shouldn’t ask right now.”

Stupid. Stupid. Why ask a fuckin’ question like that, when the kid’s floating on acid and high as a kite and vulnerable. Pat just didn’t _think_. He was thinking about other things. It just occurred to him. Because Brian’s on the bed, and his shirt’s off, and it’s impossible to look at him and not think about fucking him, and then that makes him think _fuck you Patrick stop objectifying the kid,_ and then he thinks _well fuck you too it’s not my fault he’s always so goddamn horny._

“I…I don’t…” Brian seems confused. Glances over at Pat for a second, nervous, then turns his owl-eyed gaze back upward.

“Sorry,” Pat says quickly. “You’re sexy as shit, and we can fuck as much as your heart desires, I’m not complaining, I just didn’t, uh. Didn’t want to miss anything important.”

He doesn’t know what exactly about the question freaked the kid out, and he’s not sure if he’s articulating himself clearly, and he’s also not sure if the kid’s even really listening. He seems to be thrumming with fearful tension that vibrates through his whole body. Acid does that to you. Amplifies every feeling. Bad, good, whatever. It runs away with you.

“Please,” Brian begs the ceiling, a little brokenly. “I don’t understand what you mean. What you want.”

God, poor fucking thing. He sounds so weepy already. Pat always fucking puts his foot in it, on the come-down. That’s why Simone is in charge of this bit. “Nevermind. I’ve got what I want, kid, okay? I’ve got you. And you’re incredible.” He sighs, and sidles into bed, hopes that his touch will make the apologies that his stupid fucking mouth can’t. “Sorry to flip you out. You’re perfect. I just wanted to say. You don’t need to, like, perform for me. All right?”

Brian looks genuinely confused, then, but a little less tense, thank fucking Christ. “I don’t understand, Pat.” He twines his arms around Pat’s chest, and puts their faces closer together. The kid’s so rosy-blue and beautiful, with his soft hair and his wide dark pupils. “Dyou want to try to fuck, dyou mean? I can try. I might be sloppy. Just bring me back if I get distracted.”

“No,” Pat says, and he feels vaguely sick to his stomach, at the anxious but willing little offer. God. “No, no, I wouldn’t do that. You just relax, babe. You’re supposed to enjoy yourself.”

But Brian’s trying to force himself up now, languid movements inefficient, but certainly moving his head towards Pat’s dick. Oh dear _lord_. He presses a hand in the kid’s hair. “No, no Bri. Please forget I mentioned it. I just wanna listen to some music, okay? And have you describe the colors you see, again. I don’t even know what _chartreuse_ is, to be honest, though, so we’re gonna need some like dumbed-down color words, aight?”

Brian gives up with relative ease, getting distracted by Patrick’s movement, by the music, by the instruction to think about colors and tastes and explain where they come from, in the chord progression. Pat lets the kid’s voice and the music wash over him, and it’s really fuckin pleasant, and the one good thing about acid is that even when you have a bad moment it’s pretty fuckin easy to distract and move on. Pat’s a real cunt, but at least he’s tripped enough to know that, and he can keep the kid in happy places for the rest of the night.

And everything’s hunky-dory, even they day after, when their jaws are tight and Brian is exploding with vicious leftover energy, and the world is a _little_ raw but not really quite so trippy, anymore. Brian insists on doing all his dishes ( _it helps me to have something to do with my hands_ , he says) and then they try to play video games but find that whatever chemical vestiges are still sloshing around make following the colored forms impossible, and it’s a good fucking laugh.

“That was _great_ , Pat,” the kid says into his chest, when they’re trying to settle down to sleep and not quite succeeding. “So fun.”

“Good,” he pets Brian’s hair. “You had a couple moments, but I thought overall it looked like you were chill. I’ll let you take more next time, if you want. Talking gets harder.”

“I might like that,” Brian murmurs. “Talking is what gets me in trouble.”

“Heh. You seem like you talk pretty fine. The only thing is, it's really a lot when you’re around people, so be careful before you do it at like a party. Ari does it but he’s a maniac.”

“I don’t think I could do this at a party,” Brian admits, a little shyly. “Sounds scary. It was good with you. Safe.”

This makes bile rise in Pat’s throat a little, but he shoves it down. “Well, that’s good, I guess.”

“Where dyou even get this stuff,” Brian murmurs. “From Ari?”

“Usually,” Pat shrugs. “Someone’s always got some. Y’have to ask around but like. Just let me get it for you. Don’t go nosing around in Lemelson or whatever, they’ll narc. Fletcher’s a safe bet. This time it was that asshole Franklin because Ari wasn’t holding, but—hey, kid? _—kid_?”

The jerk in his body was so violent that Pat’s voice goes thready. What damn fool thing has he said now, to make the muscles tense like that.

“What the fuck, kid, are you okay?”

“Fine,” Brian forces out quickly, and he’s making his body relax with effort, Pat can tell. “Just had a bad thought, that’s all. Snuck up.”

Pat narrows his eyes. This seems like a fucking lie but he doesn’t trust himself to suss it out right now, not without flipping the kid out again and doing even more damage than he has already. So he lets it go, and steers things back to safer ground, and tries to tease out that giggle again with some limited success.

* * *

It’s another night at caf. Pat’s sober—sober enough, anyway, to see that same goddamned pained look leak out of Brian’s face every time Pat catches his eye. The kid’s so fuckin’ good, how he washes it out with a flirty smile. Adorable, effortless, good-natured _lies._

Pat lets it go all shift, but by closing he’s fucking _pissed_.

“You’re not walking to my place,” Pat says flatly.

“Oh,” Brian blinks, and Patrick watches his poker face crack and then collect itself. “Okay.”

“I’m not letting you _limp_ all the way across campus.”

His face lightens a touch, but not all the way. “Nah, I’m good, Pat Gill. It’s been, like, weeks. I did my exercises. I’m walking just fine.”

That’s a half-truth. Brian followed the clinic’s instructions to the letter, just the way he turns in his homework in on time and counts the seconds while he brushes his teeth and washes his dishes the minute he’s done with them. He’s a stickler for things like that. So he elevates and ices and wears his brace and does his exercises every night like he’s supposed to.

Pat was never nearly so obedient, when he fucked up his knees or his shoulders in muay thai. He’d just nodded at the nurse prac and taken a handful of ibuprofen and shrugged (hoo lordy life advice don’t _shrug_ after you’ve dislocated your shoulder) and figured his body would be scrappy enough to figure it out. Which is why his knees are _like that_ now. Hopefully Brian’s will be spared the bone-mediated weather reports. It’d be about as fun in Baltimore as it is in Maine.

Still, the kid might follow instructions, but he’s physically incapable of _staying off that ankle for a few weeks_ like he’s fucking supposed to. Brian was born to stand and run and jump and fidget and dance and sometimes he forgets to fucking _chill_ with all that, for a bit. And god forbid he spend a single shift sitting on his ass. He pushes himself. And then his face gets that look on it, that it has today.

“Like hell. You’re not gonna.”

“I’m _fine_ , Pat,” Brian says, and his tired voice slides toward annoyance. “Please don’t—”

“You don’t have to like it.” Pat presses the kid’s laptop closed, which elicits a little huff of indignation. “I already did the dishes. I’ll get the trash and then I’m coming over here and carrying your ass home. Don’t fuck with me.”

Brian scowls and starts to pack up, indulging Pat’s whims, as usual—

or _seemingly_ doing so, because when he comes back from the dumpster the kid’s loping around awkwardly in his brace, re-bagging the trash cans and flipping the chairs up.

“Fucking _stop_ it,” Pat bites out.

“Stop what?” Brian smirks brattily, then wrinkles his forehead, as he shifts to another chair.

“Stop acting like that shit doesn’t _hurt_ , Brian. You’re not that good a fucking actor.”

Brian’s face falls out of his smirk, and Pat feels guilty—he didn’t mean it like _that_ —but he doesn’t apologize, because the kid’s _still_ standing and walking and doing shit that’s clearly making him wince with every fucking half-step.

“Fine,” Brian sighs, drops the last chair down. “I’ll go home tonight, then. If you don’t want me at yours.”

“That’s not what I said. I just _want_ you in one piece.”

“All of my pieces are functioning,” Brian says, half-snarky half-flirty, “but you can check on them, if you’re so insistent. Put them through their paces.”

“Maybe I will, then,” Pat growls and brushes back his hair.

Brian’s eyes are sparking with hot determination. They fuck sometimes, when Pat’s riled up and out of patience and the kid’s whiny and stubborn. It’s fucking _good_ , every time, hot and angry, dark bites and bruises, wringing those little screams of ecstasy out of Brian’s body is—

 _fuck_ he’s doing it again—

God _damn it._

The kid’s inches from him, somehow, hand sneaking up Pat’s shirt, rubbing against the skin of his belly, pinching his nipple _entirely_ too hard. “Why don’t you show me what happens when I don’t listen to you,” he breathes hotly, and—

 _fuck_ —

Pat _digs_ his fingertips into the little collarbone underneath him, pushing away the thought of—of—

“You can turn me over your knee, Patrick,” he murmurs, eyes wide and innocent. “You can make me crawl. Or just fuck me until I’m _so_ so sorry.”

“Jesus, Bri, stop—”

he’s interrupted in his feeble protestations by a bruising kiss, hand fisting in his shirt with a tight and trembling grip.  

“Why _stop_ ,” Brian hisses into Pat’s chin, rubbing himself suggestively at the bulge in Pat’s pants. “I’m giving you lip, daddy, I _deserve_ it.”

It nearly rips _tears_ out of Pat’s eyes, how hard it is to push the kid away. It’s even worse, the expression on his face, the little shattered pieces of the act fluttering away in a shower of pain and grief and angry confused consternation and something kind of like hopelessness.

Pat takes three quick breaths and pretends he’s a human being with self-control, enough to make his voice calm. “I’m sorry. I’m not—you’re turning me on, kid, there’s no fuckin’ denying it. But I’m not down for it tonight. We’re not fucking. Whatever you say.”

Brian’s mouth slants. “Okay,” he says tonelessly, and shoulders his bag. “See you on Thursday, then.”

It drives a little pulse of anxiety into the base of Pat’s skull, the way he says it. Something’s not _right_.

“Uh, Bri,” Pat says, mouth dry and not sure what to do with his hands. “It’s fine if you’re—I dunno. Whatever. Be mad if you want. But just, uh.” He leans into the intuition. “I still like it when you _come over_ , even if we don’t fuck, you know that, right?”

Brian hesitates, hitches a step as he’s walking out, a little breath of surprise—

and _shit_ , well, doesn’t that just say everything—

“I’d like that,” Brian says, softly, to the door.

“I’m carrying you,” Pat asserts, quickly, into the silence and softness, because he doesn’t know what else to say.

“Okay,” Brian agrees, but not quite as flat as last time.

* * *

They don’t talk much, on the way home, but Pat likes the feeling of the kid’s warm body over his shoulders, the soft way his skin gives under the grip of Pat’s fingers. He likes sliding the kid into his bed, even if his face still looks pained. It’s a little more open, though.

“I’m sorry,” Brian says, as Pat strips off the brace from his ankle to look at it.

“I dunno what you’re apologizing for.”

The bruise is ruddy blue-black-green, now, up the side of the kid’s foot. Like ugly graffiti on a marble sculpture. It looks better than the first day, when it was red and purple and so swollen he couldn’t fit it in a fucking shoe, not even one of Pat’s. But it still looks nasty. Nastier than it should.

Pat knows how to tie an ace bandage, so he wraps it and ties it off for the night, then gets off his knees to find some painkillers and a glass of water. The kid takes them without question, looking at Pat with those big unreadable eyes that might be angry or happy or disappointed or who the fuck knows.

 _What kind of animal does he think you are_ , Pat’s mind taps out against the inside of his skull, _that he thinks you’d only keep him around to fuck._

“You shouldn’t push yourself so hard, kid,” Pat mutters, sitting on the bed. “It’s not good for you.”

“Okay,” Brian says, _again_ , agreeing without resistance to whatever fuckin statements Pat makes.

“I _mean_ it. Not, like, in some kind of abstract sense. I mean, _literally_ , you will fucking injure yourself worse. I’m already pretty—” he pauses. This isn’t the kind of thing he says to people, but maybe Brian needs to hear it. “I’m already pretty worried about you. This isn’t healing as fast as it should. Maybe you should go back to the health center, see what they think about it.”

Brian hangs his head. “I’m—I don’t want—” He sighs. “I’m being stupid. But I’m afraid they’ll tell me to move around less. I can’t—I’ve already given up dance, Pat. I can’t—if I can’t _act_ and I can’t _work_ and—”

He trails a hand down the kid’s arm. “I get it. It’s fuckin’ rough. You’re not cut out for this kinda thing.” It feels stupid, to be sappy, but he wants to, he just _wants_ to, to erase that little vulnerable hitch in Brian’s step. “You’re too pretty to be in pain.”

The kid laughs a little, pleased. “You just say that.”

Pat pulls the body onto his, resting a shoulder under Brian’s head, as much as he can without perturbing the elevated foot. “Nope. You’re gorgeous.” He strokes a hand up the soft skin of the kid’s chest. “Thanks for letting me bring you here. You might’ve slept better in Lemelson. But I’m greedy.”

Brian shivers. “I sleep better near you, Pat.”

Well, that’s—that's— “And the loft must _suck_ , for this,” Pat gestures, down toward Brian’s foot.

“Oh, it’s a nightmare,” Brian admits. “Elevating is impossible. And we don’t have a ladder, so climbing up is like…bad.”

“Stay here, then,” Pat presses into his skin. “I’m not gonna—we don’t have to fuck like rabbits. Just do whatever feels good. It’s fuckin’ incredible to look at you, no matter what we’re doing.”

“Okay,” Brian murmurs, eyes closing. Pat doesn’t feel like he really made the point he needed to. But he’s drifting off to sleep.

* * *

It’s mysterious, why the kid’s like he is, but whatever demons he’s fighting with seem to settle down a little, as the trimester draws to a close. They sleep together. They work together. Brian drags Pat to his pottery elective. Pat introduces Brian to the finer points of whisky. Brian cools it a little with his absolute dedication to fucking in the most outrageously delightful ways, and Pat tries to be a little more thoughtful about how he runs his mouth, and Legs continues to scowl at him every chance she gets.

But as time goes on, Pat fancies that her glares get at least a little less murderous.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i can't find an official ruleset for secret queen, but we played it in college and it's a lark. fun variant called _double agent_ : mark one of your *opponent's* pawns instead, and at any point in the game you can declare it to flip sides and then control it, changing its move direction to match your other pawns.


	6. paksa waeg rang

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the chapter in which we earn our tags. chapter contains descriptions of a sexual encounter, the consensual status of which is an explicit matter of discussion by the characters herein. they do not come to clear conclusions, but you will likely find it unpleasant if drug-related dubcon / noncon is one of your triggers.

###  ** round 6. paksa waeg rang.  **

(bird peeping through nest) shield the face from strikes with forearms.   
peer through the gap in the arms. deliver a punch when opportunity arises.

* * *

Brian wakes up, fuzzy-headed, when Pat shifts. He grabs reflexively, not sure why, maybe just because he’s _so_ comfy and _so_ sleepy and he’d like _so much_ for Pat to stay in bed just a little longer, please and thank you.

“Kid,” Pat grunts. “I gotta go to class.”

“You _never_ go to class,” Brian murmurs, and then blushes a little and thinks about taking it back, because that’s kinda mean, even though it’s mostly true.

Pat doesn’t seem insulted, though. “Lab,” he says, by way of explanation. “Your alarm’s set. Go back to sleep.”

Brian says _‘kay_ , but sits up anyway. He likes watching Pat get dressed. He can see the muscles flexing in his back as he pulls on a clean white shirt, last night’s skinny jeans. Pat is lean and strong and masculine, all angles and scruffy beard and early-morning scowl. Brian likes how Pat doesn’t seem fussy about his appearance but still makes _strong_ style choices. Pat is so _himself_ , doc martens and slim black jeans and graphic tees and round thin glasses that he’s constantly breaking and taping back together.

Usually, when he watches Pat get dressed, the dark eyes dart up, catch his gaze, give him a lecherous grin. Sometimes Pat says something flirty, like _how you like this hot stuff_ , or sometimes he just mutters an earnest _fuck you’re hot._ Whatever it is, it tends to make Brian melt, and then there’s usually kissing. Brian loves that part, the feverish half-asleep kissing with Patrick standing over him, in too much of a hurry to get into any _serious_ mischief but taking his time to suck hard at Brian’s lower lip anyway.

But today, Pat just looks kind of solemn. When he glances over at Brian’s face, he hesitates.

Pat doesn’t hesitate very often—is not big about considering his words, on the whole—so something’s on his mind, something he doesn’t know how to say. Brian feels very tense, all of a sudden. He always tenses like this when Pat’s upset. Which he shouldn’t, because Pat is _often_ upset. It’s never before been because Pat wanted to kick Brian out of bed and never see him again.

Pat sighs. Steels himself. That doesn’t bode well.

“Uh. Just so you know. My housemates have seen you enough now that they’re gonna start talking.”

Oh _god_. Talking—Brian is frozen, while Pat sighs and continues.

“Not Parks. Parks is fucking clutch, she’d never say a thing. But Spencer’s got a girlfriend and she’ll fucking talk about anything that passes by her stupid face, so.”

“Okay,” Brian breathes.

Pat seems unsatisfied with this response, but doesn’t explain further. Brian feels a cold chill flush through his entire body, starting from his sternum and moving out gradually across his chest, his limbs. Goosebumps, maybe, or just frigid anticipation of pain to come.

_Oh, please god, if you’re going to do it, at least say it._

He forces his tongue into shape, forms words. Clarify first, Gilbert. Don’t jump to conclusions. Don’t panic unnecessarily. “Does that mean—do you—um—want me to be more discreet, or…?”

“No,” Pat shrugs, with a frown. “No point now, anyway. That bitch has flown.”

Brian’s mouth is dry. _Fuck._ Fuck. He’s already fucked up, and he didn’t even _know_ —it’s not fucking _fair_ — “What do you. Um. Want me to do...then?”

“Nothing,” Pat is annoyed, now, although also trying not to look annoyed. _Fuck_.

“I’m sorry,” Brian tries.

It doesn’t work. The annoyance breaks loose, comes to the fore. “Look, kid, I’m not trying to make shit _complicated_. I’m just saying. It’s about to go around that we’re fucking. So deal with it, I guess.”

Oh fuck, he better just ask, before he pisses Pat off worse. “Are you…um…is this you dumping me?”

Pat looks at him like he’s stupid. “No, dumbass. As long as you still want to fuck, I’m here.”

This statement, and the incredulous look that accompany it, inspire in Brian a _wave_ of relief so overwhelming and warm and sudden that it threatens to buckle his knees, even though he’s not fucking standing up. Chill, Gilbert. You’re not out of the woods yet. Don’t jump to conclusions. Don’t celebrate too early. Figure this out and try not to be such a _dumbass_ while you do it.

Brian brushes back his hair. “Is it…is it okay? That people know we’re hooking up?”

The taller boy stares. “I dunno, kid, you tell me. What do you _want_ them to say?”

This is bewildering to Brian, because Pat looks oddly vulnerable about the question, like he cares very much how it's answered, and that doesn’t make any freaking sense. Brian tries for honesty.

“A-anything’s fine. That we’re casual. That we’re dating. That I’m blowing you because I owe you money. _Anything_. Really. It’s fine.”

“All right.” This must be the right thing, or something close to it, because Pat grins, and the tension leaks out of his face quick and happy. Brian feels so immensely grateful for that smile that he wants to dive right across the room and kiss it.

But he’s not sure if that’d be—Pat looks like the conversation is finished—but Brian is still _really_ confused, and whatever he’s fucked up he’d really really really like to not fuck it up again.

“If you don’t—um, mind—them knowing...why’d you tell me about it?”

“Jeeze louise, kid, I just didn’t want to blow up your spot.” Pat shrugs, and he honestly looks relieved. “I know how Lems can be. Real dicks. Just didn’t want you to catch any heat for getting with a senior.”

 _Fuck_.

Fuck, he doesn’t know.

He doesn’t know who Brian _is_.

Oh god.

* * *

The pressure on his chest is so great that Brian knows it’s psychological—panic, stupid panic, scratching hopeless panic—the way that he gets when he’s really fucked up on booze and he’s been in over his head for the past hour and a half but he didn’t even realize it until he tried to do something that should be easy and his head started spinning and the room faded out and he didn’t remember why he was even trying to do it—

Dear god. Dear god he thought that _everyone_ knew.

Everyone in Lemelson certainly knows, at least, and—

although it still sucks when some junior drives a shoulder into him “accidentally” in the hallway and coughs the word _slut_ in a vicious hiss—

it had been so long since his sex life had been fresh gossip, since before move-in week, really—

he’d fooled himself into thinking that maybe he’d been forgiven? that his slate was cleaned, at least a little bit? that Pat was _such_ a bad boy he’d fuck with Brian, even knowing…

The breathing is really out of control, and Brian tries to pull himself out. He gets a few gulps down, and then steadies. Remembers where he is. Patrick’s looking at him. Fuck. Looking at him with that nervous, attentive stare like Brian is a precious thing, something that he _really_ doesn’t want to break—  

—will Pat _ever_ look at him like that again? ...once he knows?

“Uh, kid.” The dark eyes are tentative. Worried. “What’s going on?”

Brian closes his eyes and decides that he’s not allowed to cry.

And he also decides he’s going to tell the truth. He _could_ lie. He’s okay at lying. Even when his breaths are coming hot and short and jagged. He could just lie and say something stupid and put off this conversation and wring out a few more days or weeks or months of this. But that would be wrong. Pat is _going_ to find out, eventually. And he’ll be angrier, if Brian keeps lying the way he’s apparently been lying all along.

“Pat,” he breathes. “I—I need to tell you something.”

“Shoot.”

Pat’s voice is calm, but not really. It’s that kind of fake calm he gets when he’s very focused, when something big is thrumming at the periphery and it’s about to burst out into shouting or fucking or laughing or punching a wall or that wild look he gets like _you wanna help the Ridley freshmen steal a street sign? I’m driving._ It hasn’t collapsed yet, into whatever emotion it’s going to be. 

Brian swallows.

“Pat, if people know we’re fucking… it’s not going to hurt my reputation. At all. Um. If anything, it’s going to hurt _yours_.”

Pat shrugs at this, waves a hand. “Yeah, yeah. I mean, creepy senior picking off freshmen, not the _most_ flattering, but if the shoe fits—”

“No,” Brian says shortly. “Not what I mean.”

Pat’s eyes narrow. “What _do_ you mean, then, kid?”

“I mean that. Um. You’re not the first senior I’ve fucked? And _trust me_ , everyone knows about the first one. Or um. Ones.”

It’s agony, the five seconds it takes Pat to put it together.

The time drags on impossibly, like a slow-motion reel, the confused furrow of Pat’s brow, thinking, thinking, thinking. It’s almost a relief when the expression shifts: realization, doubt, anger, surprise.

And then, he knows. And Brian forces himself to feel relieved. _At least I didn’t have to say it._

It does make his stomach churn when Pat’s expression locks onto something most like horror, when his hands fly up to grip his newly-tamed hair theatrically.

“Holy shit, you’re…you’re _that_ frosh?!”

“Yeah,” Brian says, and if his voice trembles at least he’s not throwing up. Maybe he’ll find out what it’s like to get punched, today. He should save it for that.

“Oh my fucking _god_.”

Pat collapses on the bed, and looks dangerously close to putting his head in his hands. Brian starts to shiver. Getting dumped always sucks, but this one—oh, this one is going to _hurt_.

“For the record,” Brian says, sitting up, drawing up his legs, trying to sound normal, because if this is salvageable, he’s sure as _hell_ going to try. “I don’t have the clap. And I didn’t know he was filming. And I definitely didn’t blow Dean Curtis to get out of being expelled—”

“Jesus Christ. It’s you.” Pat’s head actually _is_ in his hands now. Oh no, oh no. He's _too_ upset. This isn't—he'd hoped—

“I’ll get out,” Brian says suddenly, deciding that his former bravery was the wrong decision.  He shouldn’t have done it face to face. He should have sent a text and disappeared. He can’t bear this, not here, not now, when Pat is sleepy and handsome and about to tell him _exactly_ what he thinks of _that frosh_.

Brian scrambles up, ignores Pat's horrified silence, looks for his shoes. “I thought you knew—I would have told you—I’m sorry. I’m going—I won’t come back.”

He knows his hands are shaking too hard to make the laces work, so he just shoves them on his feet and scans for his shirt and hopefully before the shock wears off—

Patrick grabs him, then, spins him around, and—oh _fuck_ —

“What the fuck are you saying? Don’t go anywhere.”

Pat’s voice is a growl, and he’s so upset, and so angry, his grip is so tight Brian is sure it will bruise. He jumps, when Pat shakes him, and screws his eyes shut, because if he’s going to get punched at least he won’t flinch.

“What the _fuck_ , Brian. Talk to me. You’re not making sense _._ ”

Yes, yes _thank you_ , a chance to talk his way out of this—he opens his mouth quick and just lets himself babble—

“Just let me go. _Please_. I’ll never bother you again. Just say that I threw myself at you—I’ll tell them—you brushed me off—I begged you—you wouldn’t come near me—you thought I was trash—th-they’ll believe that— _anyone_ would believe that—I _swear_ I’ll sell it _._ ”

“God _._ ” He peeks an eye open. Pat’s face has never been so dark. “What do you think I _am_? What do you think _you_ are?”

Brian swallows. Of course. He has to say it. They always want him to say it.

“A s-slut.” His voice is hitching but he gets it out. “I’m a slut. I know. Everyone knows. I d-didn’t mean to—to lie to you. Please, don’t—”

He starts begging, but he doesn’t know what to beg for, so the sentence lies unfinished.

Pat does let him go. Brian wants to flee, but he’s still not dressed and he weighs how bad it’d be to scramble across campus, shirtless, covered in hickeys, versus staying here and possibly…

He glances at Pat. He’s not looming. Not standing close anymore, at all. He’s stepped back, actually, and his hands are up, palms out, and his face is… it’s weird—Brian can’t place it, because it must be some level of furious that he’s never seen on Pat before—

because Pat _never_ cries…

“Jesus Christ, Brian, I’m not going to hurt you,” Pat says, oddly feeble _._ “I’m not _angry_ at you. For fuck’s sake. You’re not a slut. You’re the prefrosh that got _raped_ at summer session.”

Brian blinks. Huh. That’s new.

“No,” Brian shakes his head. “No, I—no, that’s not right. I didn’t get raped. I just—was a fucking idiot—”

Pat’s looking at him and his expression is deeply confusing—if those _are_ tears then maybe it’s—not betrayal, but pity? anguish? suspicion? regret?—but at least maybe he’s not that angry…?

“Who told you you had to say that.”

“No one. I consented. Before. When I was sober.”

“ _Bullshit_.”                                                                                                       

Brian doesn’t know what to say to that. People always tell him he’s lying. So he just says, “Can I go?”

“ _No_ ,” Pat says emphatically, and then shakes himself and says. “Fuck. I mean yes. Of course you can go. If you want. I want you to stay. But you can go.”

Pat actually is kind of crumpling, puts his back against the wall, lets himself slide down it fast until he’s sitting on his ass against it, long arms resting on bony knees, looking up at Brian instead of down. He’s definitely crying, Brian realizes, a few stray tears.

Brian really has no idea what to do now.

He doesn’t leave. They stare at each other for a long time, until Brian also sinks to the floor, sits on it, cross-legged. They sit and breathe and look at each other, and Brian’s heart doesn’t know how it’s supposed to be beating right now, what rhythm of taps fits that strange, fierce, angry, broken, awful look on Patrick’s face.

Pat opens his mouth, thinks, and shuts it again.

“You can ask anything,” Brian says quickly.

“Were you really seventeen?”

 _Oh._ That’s not the question he thought he would get. “Yeah.”

“ _Fuck_.”

Pat taps his head against the wall, harder than is necessary.

“It’s not—I’m not—I wasn’t a _virgin_ , Pat.”

The sound that Pat makes could be a laugh, if it had any humor in it. “Kid, I know you’ve done this before. You’re fucking _great_ in bed. You’ve clearly had practice.”

Brian bites his lip, nervously, at the compliment. He knows Pat hates their age difference—hates feeling old _—_ but he thinks Pat also secretly likes it, likes it when Brian plays innocent, likes grabbing his cherubic curls, likes calling him _baby boy_ right before he comes all over Brian’s smooth, upturned face. He doesn’t know why the age would matter, in this context. He’s old enough. He consented.

“Did you hear…um…what did you hear?”

“I heard that Todd is even more of a shitbag than I already knew.” Pat growls.

A little spark of hope fans, somewhere inside him, into a flame. “Yeah.”

Pat’s gaze narrows. “What did admin do to you?”

“Nothing,” Brian shrugs. “Yelled at me. Threatened to kick me out. They could have—the drugs.”

“That’s insane.”

“It’s not,” Brian says, gently. “I got myself into a lot of fucking trouble that week. I—um. Wasn’t very smart.”

Pat runs his hand through his hair and stares, wild-eyed. “I don’t care who you fucked, kid. Or what you smoked. I saw the fucking _video._ ”

Brian winces. Of course he’s seen it. Everyone’s seen it. He doesn’t actually remember being double-teamed, but the photo evidence is inarguable.

“It wasn’t all, um, like _that_. No matter what you hear.”

“Apparently I haven’t heard shit, kid.” Pat says, and his voice sounds a little lost.

“Okay,” Brian says. He watches Pat master his expression, dash the wetness off his face. It’s reconstructing itself into a scowl, which is at least a bit more familiar than all this.

“Let me—here’s what I heard, kid. I heard that the campus is kind of a _hostile environment_ for queer kids, no fucking shit. I heard that last year we raised such a fuckin’ stink about it that they started a summer program to _address our concerns._ I heard that the senior mentors were supposed to offer you _guidance_ to help you adapt to the _new college experience_.” He barks out a sound that is definitively not a laugh. “Then admin picked their darlings to head it and that went about as well as anyone would have expected.”

“I think it was a bit of a disaster, yeah,” Brian gives a little wan smile. “I don’t think they’ll do it again.”

“Yeah no _shit_. They fucking fed you straight to the wolves.”

Brian sighs. “It’s not that simple, Pat. I was flirting. I wanted to get laid. I wanted to get high. I’m not proud of it, but no one took advantage of me.” He grimaces. “I got what I wanted.”

“That is _fucked_ , Brian.” Pat says, and his voice is so harsh it makes Brian flinch again. “You were going to college. Everyone wants to get some and buy drugs. What happened to you is a crime.”

Brian shivers. This conversation is giving him whiplash. “Pat, you’re missing your lab…”

“I’m not going.”

There’s a metallic taste in Brian’s mouth. He realizes he’s biting his nails—one’s started to bleed. He stops, but he’ll be back at it before long. Goddammit, he needs some new nail polish.

“Do you want to get back in bed?” Pat says at him, and the way he says it makes Brian think maybe this is the second time he’s repeated it. “Because you still seem freaked out. And I want to tell you what I’m thinking and you know I’m dog-shit at that when I’m looking at your cute fucking face.”

“ _Please_ ,” Brian shudders in relief, and then he’s scrambling and sweating and horizontal and pressing his back to Pat’s bony chest and getting held, and held, and held…

…and the metallic taste is fainter and he can’t see whether or not Pat is still crying and it’s just. Better.

“I’m sorry,” Pat murmurs against the back of his head. “For grabbing you.”

Brian hitches a little half-laugh, because literally this is the _last_ thing that deserves an apology in this conversation. He _loves_ when Pat grabs him. When he grabs _hard_. When his eyes are dark with lust and they get barely in the door and Pat is on him in a moment, ripping his shirt off so fast that it breaks buttons, shoving a knee between his legs, pinning him to the wall for frantic groping. He loves the next morning when Pat points out the hickeys, half guilty, half-teasing, and Brian suggests hiding them with an ascot and Pat laughs his ass off at the thought.

He also loves when Pat grabs him gently. When they’re sitting in caf late at night, just the two of them, and custies _could_ come in but Pat’s declared that they’re packing up early, and Brian’s waffling on whether or not to let him, and Pat grazes a thumb across his jaw and tilts his head up and says _if you lock up I’ll show you a spot which the security cameras don’t cover so well_ and Brian does it, because he wants to be ravished by Pat in every single location that he can, and he doesn’t really even care who sees it.

* * *

They talk for a while. Calm each other down.

“I’m not mad at you, kid. I’m just… _Jesus_ …you didn’t fucking do anything wrong, okay?”

“Okay,” Brian agrees, so they stop going around on that point.

“I don’t care about details. Or whatever you think you did. You’re not at fault. They were seniors working a fucking orientation program. Your whole job is to try and fit in. Their whole job is to _not give you drugs_ and _not fuck you._ ”

Brian laughs a little wetly, and Pat grumbles. “Yeah okay I appreciate the irony. But at least I know I’m trash. I shouldn’t be allowed around things like you.”

“You’re not trash,” Brian murmurs.

“At least I had the goddamn courtesy to wait until after the first day of class.”

“Patrick,” Brian says gently. “I’m a grown-up, okay? I can make my own decisions. I kissed Todd, and I let him take me up on the roof, and I took what he gave me, and I wanted to fuck him. I thought he was hot.”

Although Pat refuses to entertain this discussion, Brian wants to be clear. He set out to get in some trouble, that week. He knows how to flirt and he knows how to fuck and he knows how to show up in the wrong place at the wrong time when things are just about to get out of hand. Brian _likes_ it when things get out of hand. He likes blowing people, too, because he knows he’s good at it, and the things people say to him when he’s on his knees are wicked and make his toes curl.

He’d actually been psyched when Todd loosened up a little, passed him the handle, this cool smart _senior_ running a hand across his shoulders like Brian was _interesting_ , telling him that he was sexy— he’d flirted plenty, and more and more as things went on, and eventually when Todd broke down and gave up on saying _I really shouldn’t_ and went licking into his mouth, Brian distinctly remembers feeling a victorious burn of triumph.

“What about the other guy?” Pat says, viciously. “Did you consent to _him_ , too, or did he just show up after you were high off your ass and stick his dick down your throat?”

Brian sighs. “I kissed Franklin too. Before.”

“ _Fuck_ ,” Pat exclaims, like he’s been punched in the gut.

Brian screws up his face a little wryly. “I told you I’m not proud of that week.”

“No, no, I’m not—I told you, I don’t give a fuck who you kissed,” Pat sounds like he’s crying again. “I just…I didn’t know it was Franklin. That’s all.”

“Oh.”

Pat’s reaction is so strange. Brian doesn’t know quite how to parse it. Most people who cared just thought he was a slut. The worst ones thought he’d maybe tried to get Todd expelled on purpose. Some folks thought admin had been negligent. Other thought it was just always wrong, for a senior to fuck a freshman. But he didn’t really get a lot of tears.

It _had_ been bad, when the video came out. He didn’t remember that part. He remembered a lot. Some of it was good. But by that point…he’d fucked people before, sure, and gotten high, but just weed and beer at band camp, not vodka and pills and whatever else.

But yknow. He’d been eager to try. He was always eager. Sometimes it bit him in the ass. You live, and you learn.

“Why are you so upset,” Brian says, as Pat continues to cry into his hair.

“That video was disgusting.” Pat says. Brian stiffens a little.

“Not because of you, kid. Because they’re fucking _despicable_.”

“I don’t remember it,” he admits softly. “I haven’t watched it very much. The part in the clip. I was—out of it. By then. I guess.”

“No offense dude, but that’s fucking _obvious._ The way you were just…just _limp_.”

It’s weird, to feel Pat shudder behind him.

“They’re dicks, for posting it,” Brian agrees. “But it’s not like—I fucked Todd, Pat, when I was pretty sober. Scout’s honor. I even liked it. It’s not like they were doing something crazy.”

“They should be in prison,” Pat says darkly. “But Franklin’s the fucking president of his house, and Todd’s a third-generation rich fuck waste of space. They decided to throw you under the bus instead. _Jesus_. I’m so sorry, kid. You deserve better than this.”

Brian doesn’t know what to do with any of this, but he’s grateful. “It’s all right.”

“Wrong,” Pat threads fingers into Brian’s hair, gently. “It’s fucked up. And it’s fucked up, that you thought I’d be angry. The Lem gossip must be goddamn brutal.”

“Yeah,” Brian admits. “It was—rough. At first. It’s kind of petered out.”

“If you give me names,” Pat declares fervently, “I can call in favors. I’ll make sure it fucking peters out so hard that no one is willing to _glance_ at you sideways. We’re a thing, now, you and me, and that means you can call on Ridley House any time to settle your scores. They’ll set things right.”

It makes Brian feel small, but in a good way, as Pat’s fingers stroke the nape of his neck protectively. Willing to start shit for him. Like with Driscoll. All rage and retribution and lust. “We’re a thing?”

“We’ve _been_ a thing,” Pat murmurs, “for like a month now, kid.”

Brian’s body is starting to get unconfused, at least a little bit, starting to hesitantly release the cold sweat and tight muscles and bright nerves. Pat’s still muttering, though, almost as if to himself.

“That poor sweet little frosh got _got_ by the creepy old Ridley senior. The mean one with the stupid hair. That guy’s trouble. Haven’t you heard?”

“I heard it’s the other way ‘round,” Brian says, slyly. “I heard that he got himself hired on at caf just to flirt. Because he heard that Pat Gill was the man to get. I heard that kid _likes_ trouble.”

“Well, you have a point there,” Pat hums. “Maybe they’re just a good match. Inveterate sinner and pretty as sin.”

Brian’s heart feels like it’s going to burst, when Pat says things like that. “What are they doing now, you think?”

Pat is quiet, for a moment. “I dunno what the little one is doing. But the tall one is smitten, I know that. He knows when he’s got a good thing going.”

“This is a good thing,” Brian repeats.

“ _You’re_ a good thing,” Pat says. “Too good for me. I don’t deserve to keep you.”

“Keep me, please,” Brian snuggles joyfully into Pat’s embrace, letting the kisses at the nape of his neck make him shiver.

“I couldn’t give you up if I tried. Anyone will tell you that, about me. Takes what he wants. Doesn’t give it up. They’ll know you’re stuck with my claws in you.”

Fingernails lightly scratching down his back accent the words. Brian turns around, because he wants to see Pat’s face. “I want people to know. If that’s ok. That you—that I—that we’re—”

“ _Everyone_ will know that we’re a thing.” Pat’s face is fierce. “That you’re mine. That your sweet little ass is planting itself in my bed on the reg. That I hit the jackpot. That if they put a single solitary frown on your baby face, they answer to _me_.”

Brian seizes Pat’s mouth in a kiss, because he’s so happy, so so happy, and he’s never felt so scared and so angry and so wretched and so fucking _happy_ on a goddamn Thursday morning before.


	7. bughouse

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> potential triggers: a couple semi-graphic descriptions of non-consensual sexual encounters, some discussions of bureaucratic fuckery that is, unfortunately, realistic as fuck.

###  ** round 7. bughouse. **

a chess variant for four players on two boards. normal rules apply in each game.  
captured pieces from one game are immediately passed on to join the teammate on the other board.

* * *

For all that, Brian is really fucking resilient. He bounces back from that wreck of a conversation like it’s _nothing_. By the next week, he’s flirting and grinning and working his caf shifts with a smile, and also letting Pat slide an arm around his waist, brush a thumb against the soft skin of his hip. He dips his chin and giggles and plays shy, just like always, and then attacks him with hot enthusiastic kisses.

Pat isn’t quite as good at getting over it.

He spends an inordinate amount of time next to Brian scanning the vicinity for threats—for Todd or Franklin, of course—but also for whatever ratbag Lems might give him a hard time, or asshole jocks like Driscoll, or anyone, anyone who might see Pat has a good thing going and come try to take it away from him.

And it doesn’t help that he watches the video again. And again.

Because he’s the kind of guy that looks at car wrecks. Just to see the blood. Not because it makes him _happy_ , but because it _hurts_. Like pressing on a bruise.

It is certainly Brian, in the video. His face doesn’t appear (thank god for small blessings) and it’s blurry, and shaky, and only a few seconds long. But the slim pale arms—and the mole on his shoulder—and the hair, the hair is unmistakable, soft and curly and with that pervert Franklin’s fingers twisted in it like a spider.

Todd’s voice says _now watch him take it_

and there’s a laugh that features these days in Pat’s nightmares,

but thankfully the video ends there, because it’s clearly too difficult to thrust and film and support all the weight of the kid’s body at one time.

_Psychopaths._

How much longer did it last? Pat wonders. After that moment. After Brian was dosed with mystery pills and fucked out and his head lolling to one side, careless hands twisting him however they wanted him?

Did they just dump him, after? In his bed? Let him wake up alone, and confused, and covered with rooftop gravel and scratches and aching, but not knowing quite why? Did it wake his roommate, the two seniors dragging in his little abused body and innocently saying _oh, he just got a bit sick_ _is all._

Or did they take him back to Todd’s room and _play_ with him all night, touching him, petting him, prying open his mouth, purring sick shit in his ear, calling him a slut, telling him how good he took it, how they’d like to do it again, marking him with bites and scratches he wouldn’t remember?

Or did Todd do more _sharing_ , that just didn’t make it to snapchat—?

 _Fuck._ Pat puts his head in his hands and wars with the urge to watch it again. _Fuck_.

Eventually, he can’t stand it anymore, and he goes to talk to Roy.

* * *

Pat shoves past the Lem struggling with the RFID door, and pushes through the crew of little jerks on the stairs. Roy’s got his door open, so Pat just comes in and shouts loud enough to be heard through headphones.

“How do you sleep at night, Chang?”

Roy, startled, spins his chair around. His expression shifts, when he sees Pat, goes tight in that way. They have a history. It’s acrimonious, now, but that’s mostly for show. They’ve moved on. And they know so much more about each other than enemies normally do. It’s hard to _really_ hate a guy, when you know how he likes his tea, how he looks when he wakes up with a hangover, how floaty and chatty he gets on LSD.

“What’re you doing here, Gill,” he spits.

“Start talking to me about Brian. Gilbert. _Your_ freshman. And what happened to him in summer.”

Roy stands, suddenly, and muscles the door shut _fast_. “Keep your fucking voice down, Patrick. That shit is on lockdown, or it’s my head. You trying to get me kicked out? Or sued? I can’t fucking pay my way out. You know that. So go get your gossip elsewhere.”

The tension in his voice crackles. It’s always hard to tell, with Roy, if he’s quite telling the truth.

“Yeah, fine and good, but that’s bullshit. Brian tells me everyone knows. So don’t play dumb.”

Roy cocks his head and gives an expression that is something like a sneer. “Oh. So you two _are_ a thing. My, my, Patrick. You really are _incorrigible._ ”

He really shouldn’t get his back up at that, the way those five syllables spread out, like fingers on a hand, gesturing towards something. It’s not like he’s wrong _._

“Call me what you have to,” Pat says humorlessly. “But keep ignoring me and see what happens. You’ve got a hell of a lot more to lose.”

There’s a beat, where they stare at each other, like Roy’s thinking about it. But Pat knows him well enough to know he’s gonna cave.

“Fine,” Roy sits again, sighs, gestures loosely at Pat to do the same, although there’s no other chair. Pat leans against the desk, arms crossed. “What are you ticked about?”

“I’m ticked that this kid got a target put on his back in his first week, and apparently he’s still catching shit for it. In _your_ house.”

Roy shrugs, and his expression clears a bit. As if he expected it to be worse. “Oh, people gossip, Patrick. They hear stuff. Some people talk smack. What can you do?”

Pat _growls_ in rage, steps—

Roy gives just a shadow of a flinch—

fucking piece of shit he _hates_ being around Roy _jesus_ Christ fuck use your _fucking words_ Patrick—

he rocks his weight back and forth a couple times and folds his arms again and digs his nails into the underside of his arms and _forces_ himself to lean back on the desk again and just glare.

Fucking Roy watches this entire performance with something bordering on amusement. “Temper.”

“Yeah, fuck you, I still got it,” Pat hisses, but it’s not particularly nasty. Almost pleading, really. “So help me out here. Who should I point it at.”

The little round-shouldered senior gives a theatrical shrug. “Unless you’re gonna work your way through everyone on campus, Patrick, just let it go. You fuck someone like Todd, you’re asking for everyone to draw their own conclusions. It’ll blow over.”  

“That’s fucking _sick_ , Roy.” Pat’s voice cracks. “Did you _see_ the video? You’re better than this.”

“Everyone’s seen it, Pat,” Roy says, but his tone does gentle, a bit. “Yeah, I saw it. It was…a lot. I was…surprised…to see Frank at the next leader’s meeting. Thought he’d be long gone. But admin came to an agreement, I guess.”

“They fucking _took_ _their side_ , Roy. You aren’t stupid. You know _why_. You know Todd’s got the money and the power and the lawyers and Frank’s got a whole pile of noisy frat fucks who’d raise a goddamn stink—”  

—he stops mid-sentence, takes two four-counts, waits for his vision to clear—

“—and all they had to do to get out of that mess was con a seventeen-year-old kid into believing that he better keep quiet about getting raped _for_ _his own good_.”

Roy pauses, at this jagged pronouncement. “I dunno enough to know that, Pat.”

There are gonna be marks on Pat’s arms from his fingernails, but he keeps it together. “How much is _enough_ for you, Roy.”

A sigh. “Look, you don’t have the whole picture here, Patrick. I got briefed. I know everything is sealed. I know Todd and Frank and Brian signed—they agreed not to talk about it. I know they were careful with the kid’s dorm placement, and that’s it. Not perfect, maybe, but close enough.”

Pat scowls. “If he’d been placed in Ridley we’d have ripped Todd’s door off its fucking hinges and thrown him in the river.”

“I believe that,” Roy smiles, a little guilty. “But the kid _picked_ Lemelson, Pat. He liked us.”

“Uh-huh. So I guess you’d say it’s his own damn fault, then, if he lives to regret it?”

Roy rolls his eyes. “Shut up, Pat. He fits in here. He’s got a lot of friends, actually, Pat. The smores love him. They’re all into improv and glitterbombing and Mario Kart, or whatever kids do these days who don’t smoke hookah and spend all their time trying to look cool.”

“Good,” says Pat, and he means it. He doesn’t know much about Brian’s friends, he realizes. He’d like to.

“If you know someone who’s hassling him, give me the info, though.” Roy says, and he’s being sincere, actually, which is hard to read on Roy because he’s pretty much permanently raising an eyebrow. It’s just his face. “I can’t—it’s not _easy_ to take steps, Pat. Not on hearsay. Things have to be kept quiet.”

“Fucking brave soldier for bureaucracy, as usual, Roy.”

“Look, Pat,” Roy sighs, “I try to handle it, okay? The kid hasn’t complained to me. To anyone. I’ve got no receipts. But I’m not fucking blind. I knew Luce was giving him a hard time, and I dealt with that.”

“Good. But it isn’t one person, Roy. This kid has a complex. People have been _saying_ shit to him.”

Roy screws up his face a bit, inclines his head. “Remember that Janet was going with Todd, then. So she was really upset about the whole thing, and she’s got a lot of friends in the junior class, who wanted to back her up. It’s not _right_ , but—”

Pat runs a hand through his hair. He gets it. It _does_ make sense. But he’s not satisfied. “I know you’re not—you wouldn’t let someone beat him up—you’ll stop it, when you see—”

“I appreciate you recognizing that I’m not a complete fuck,” Roy cuts in dryly, but Pat barrels on.

“—he’s just a _kid_. Who got here and wanted to fit in and Todd fuckin’ pounced on him before his first fuckin’ day. And admin told him he better keep his whore mouth shut. And it is fucking _killing me_ —” tone, tone, corral your tone you maniac— “...it’s killing me to think he’s living with...shit. People who want him to think he’s trash.”

Roy nods, a bit apologetically. “Yeah, okay, it’s fucked. Look, Pat…I’ll try to keep a closer eye. I will. And you’ll tell me—any specifics you get? People I should talk to? Or tell him to tell me? I’m open to ideas, about what you think I should do. As long as it’s not burning down a fucking building or something.”

“Why do you hate lateral thinking so much,” Pat mutters and Roy, surprised, laughs.

“Pat, I feel for the kid. I do. I know he really had a rough go, the first quarter. He’s a cheerful sonofabitch, though. Grin and bear it type. He doesn’t seem to let it slow him down.”

“Yeah,” Pat sighs out a long breath, rubs a hand at his face. Of course the kid hasn’t complained. Of course, he’s bouncy as a fucking ball of rubber. Of course Roy wouldn’t have anything to do, not really, not within the letter of the law. That's how it works, at this fucking place. 

It's a few seconds—maybe even a minute—of just looking at each other again. This is probably the longest time they've been in a room together since sophomore year. All things being equal, it's probably gone better than expected.  

“Yeah," Pat repeats, for no reason. "Sorry…sorry. For not having any fuckin’ ideas. And for coming in hot. I just found out, a few days ago, that it was him.”

“Really?” Roy cocks his head. “Shit, man. That…kinda makes me feel better, to be honest.”

Pat laughs dryly. “Yeah, I know it’s a bad look. Bad enough that I picked out a babyfaced twink from the Lemelson frosh. Worse that it’s _him_. What kind of monster would do that.”

An understanding smile that he doesn’t deserve. “I know you didn’t _pick him out_ , Pat. You’re not like that. If anything, I’m sure you brushed him off a dozen times before he stuck. I could see that. That kid keeps trying. Sometimes there’s just chemistry.”

Roy is looking at him with something approaching affection, and it makes Pat uncomfortable. He wants to say something sharp, but he also…well. He could _really_ hurt Roy, if he wanted. But he doesn’t really want to. “Some chemistry. You should have seen how bad I fucked up this week, Roy. Colossally.”

“Oh? Do tell. You know there’s nothing better than fuckup stories about exes.”

“I freaked him out. When he told me.”

Roy nods. “Uh-huh. You didn’t take it well?”

“I wasn’t _mad_.” Pat stops, amends. “Well, I wasn’t mad _at him_.”

“Hard to tell, with you, sometimes.”

“Yeah. I was—I was just really fucking out of my depth. He was saying things—apologizing—calling himself terrible shit—he thought I was dumping him.”

“Oh jeez,” Roy says. “I can see this. Yup. Exactly. You losing your shit. Him thinking you’re mad at him.”

“It’s worse. I—yelled _._ I grabbed him, Roy. I _shook_ him.”

“You can be pretty physical, Patrick. It’s one of your best qualities, but yeah. I’d imagine he freaked out.”

“He…thought I was going to…I dunno. Hit him. Or…I don’t even know. He _begged_ me, Roy. To please just let him go. Like I was going to stop him. And do… _what_ with him?”

“He was just afraid,” Roy cuts in, gently. “Panicking. That’s pretty heavy stuff, he’s working through. And you guys are together, but not for that long, right? He doesn’t know how you’re going to react. It doesn’t mean he doesn’t trust you.”

“He shouldn’t trust me,” Pat says darkly, but Roy just laughs at him.

“Always the melodrama. It sounds like whatever you fucked up, you made up for it—more than—he’s dancing down the fucking halls whistling showtunes lately so I know that it can’t be _that_ shit. God, I don’t know how you keep up. He’s like a puppy.”

“Yeah, and I keep kicking it.”

“Good thing he’s such a bouncy kid, then. You fuck up, he cries, he bounces back. Stop moping over it; he’s the one that’s got the fuckin reason to mope.”

“You’re a dick, Roy.”

“Yeah,” Roy smiles, “Keep telling yourself that. Now get out of here. Why don’t you go bug your young piece of ass and _really_ get the gossip moving around here. It’s a slow week. His room’s downstairs.”

Pat pushes off the desk and goes to do, he thinks, just that. “Thanks, Roy. You’re all right.”

“And you’re still a fucking disaster, Pat Gill. Good thing you have the looks.”

* * *

Pat does drop by Brian’s room, just to say hi, but regrets it almost as soon as he finds the place. There’s a trio of girls in there, playing Smash uproariously, and when he sticks his head in one of them shrieks something and everyone collapses into noisy giggles.

“You look busy,” he murmurs, and makes to leave, but Brian leaps up, and his eyes are shining.

“Pat! Come in—come play with us!” He grabs for Pat’s wrist and leads him in, gesturing to his friends. “This is Ashley. Jenna. Allegra—”

“He knows me,” Legs says dryly. “Hello Pat. Good to finally see your face around here.”

Pat tries to be nonchalant. “Just dropping by—not trying to interrupt your game—looks pretty crowded—”

“ _Please_ play with us,” Brian says, and he _pouts_. This isn’t fair, he can’t be doing that in public, not when it makes Pat’s heart feel like jelly and his face betray a series of soft emotions that he very carefully pretends not to have. He can’t have Legs _looking_ at him like that.

“I can fit in a game,” Pat acquiesces, and Brian pushes him onto the tiny couch, between Ashley and Allegra, and he’s suddenly touching two people more than he’s touched _anyone_ all year who wasn’t Brian. Allegra is warm and firm and smells like coconut, and Ashley is soft and small and making goofy faces, and he’s trying to process Legs reaching around his shoulders for something and Ashley grabbing his hand to give him his controller when Brian throws down a pillow onto the floor in front of him and _snuggles_ his way in, resting his back against the couch and his arms are pressing into Pat’s shins and it’s forcing Pat’s legs apart so his knee and Allegra’s knees are pressed tight against each other and Ashley, who’s sitting on her feet, _has_ to be feeling Pat’s bony elbow in her side.

It’s like death, but an excessively cuddly kind of death, and it takes three consecutive losses before he can even begin to process that much physical contact with any kind of chance at sanity, and then Brian and Jenna start to _sing_ whenever they fall off a stage, and oh good lord in heaven above.

He closes his eyes and rests his head back, for a second, overwhelmed.

“Y’alright there, Patrick?” Legs murmurs, amused, so quiet amid the raucous noise that no one else seems to hear.

“This is purgatory,” he says, soft and strained.

“Well, we all have to atone for our sins somehow,” she smirks. 

* * *

After far more games than Pat thought he was capable of, the kids start getting drowsy. Legs takes a look at Brian’s drooping head and says “We should call it a night. Pat, you’re sleeping here, right?”

“I—”

“Jenna can crash in my room—if Trace is all right with it—I thinks she’s headed over to the boyfriend’s tonight. Brian, will you go take Jenna and bat your eyes at Trace? See if she’s cool.”

Jenna offers Brian an arm up, and they go off on their manufactured errand. Ashley permits herself to be ushered out, yawning. Allegra pushes the door shut.

Pat sighs. “What d’you want, Legs.”

“Just a little reassurance. That you’re not just fucking around. He’s a good kid. And he’s _really_ into you.” She’s looking at him, and her glare is still harsh, but not as bad as the day she nearly punched him.

Pat doesn’t know what to say, to that. Brian _is_ too good for him. Too young for him. Too delicate, and pretty, and funny, and sweet, and talented. It’s sickening, really. But he also knows that he can’t let him go.

“I’m not just fucking around. I’m into him. God help me. Is that what you want to hear?”

“I want to hear that despite reports you have a fucking _soul_ , Pat Gill, and aren’t just chasing tail,” she spits. “And I wanted to tell you that if you hurt him, you’re going to have me to deal with.”

“You’re late, then, Allegra,” Pat runs a hand through his hair. “If you’re gonna want a piece of me every time I hurt this kid, then I owe you at least three or four already. I’m a disaster.”

Her face softens; she almost smiles at that. “Good answer. Guilt, I can work with. And clearly you’re fucking obsessed with him. I just saw you hang out with a passel of Lems for _hours_ because he _pouted_ at you. So that’s something.”

Pat leans his head against the wall. “Can I ask you to do something for me?”

“If it’s to cheat off me for the film midterm then no. Otherwise fine.”

“Can you keep an ear to the ground for me?”

“How so you mean,” she says, cautiously.

“For gossip. About Brian. I—” he chokes, to admit it. “Apparently I’m the last to know about what happened with Todd. And he’s been getting shit on for it. By Lems. For months.”

Allegra processes this. “Yeah, sounds about right. _Fuck,_ I’m glad I didn’t punch you. I thought…”

“I know what you thought,” Pat brushes his hair back. “You weren’t wrong to think it, okay? It probably wouldn’t have stopped me.”

Legs looks at him, a little contrite. “Pat. I think you give _yourself_ your reputation, sometimes. You’ve been dating the kid for months. You clearly are out of your mind for him. I just thought…I thought you might have figured he was an easy lay. I was wrong. Sorry.”

“Don’t forgive me until I stop fucking up,” Pat says sharply. “But look. We’re pretty public now and—if he’s getting pushed around I need to _know_ about it. Roy’s a fucking pussy. And Brian won’t _tell_ me.”

“I’ll get it to you,” she nods. “And you do the same. I have my own resources.”

“All right,” he says, as Brian opens the door and peeks cautiously around the handle.

“You can come in, Brian,” Patrick gestures. “Allegra is done giving me the business. We came to an agreement. I break your heart, she breaks my arm. Standard big-sister stuff.”

Brian slips in shyly. “Jenna’s in your room,” he says to Legs, who gets up.

She turns back to Pat, as she exits, and makes the gesture for _I’m watching you_. “Brian,” she says without looking at him. “Be careful with this one. I’ve known him a long time. He’s a fucking asshole, he does too many drugs, he’s one strike from getting expelled, _and_ he fucking beat my score on the film analysis paper, which I _know_ he wrote in one night. An absolute jackass.”

“That was a fluke,” Pat shrugs. “I’m sure yours was better. The grading TA and I have a history.”

“I _KNEW_ it,” Allegra huffs, and slams the door. 

* * *

Brian is oddly shy, as they get undressed. Pat doesn’t have anything to change into, but he just strips down to shorts and they fit themselves in the loft. It’s been a while, since Pat has slept in one of these. It _should_ be claustrophobic, your head six inches from the ceiling, but it’s fine, actually. Almost cozy.

“What did you talk to Allegra about,” Brian murmurs into Pat’s chest.

“Begged for forgiveness, mostly,” Pat says idly. “She knows you’re too good for me.”

“Stop saying that,” Brian squirms, but his tone sounds happy. “You always say that.”

“It’s true,” Pat says fervently, as he gropes at Brian through his underwear. “I’m absolutely the worst thing for you.”

Brian lets himself be positioned, lets Pat get an arm under him, another one pushing his knees apart. “Thanks for playing with us, today. I know it’s not—not your thing—but it means a lot—meeting my friends.”

“I liked it,” Pat says, and finds he’s not lying. “They’re good. I would do it again. It’s probably the most social contact I’ve had in weeks. And you know. It’s nice to win.”

“I knew you started throwing games,” Brian laughs, although it’s cut off by heavier breathing. “I don’t think they noticed, though. You were subtle.”

“I’m very discreet,” Pat smirks. “Here’s some discretion. Let me jerk you off.”

“Nooo let’s fuck,” Brian whines. “C’mon, we made Jenna leave and everything.”

“Kid we have like a _foot_ of clearance up here.”

“Not enough for you?” Brian teases and Pat groans. “C’monnnn. I’ll even be on top if you want. Please.”

“You’re _so_ fucking randy,” Pat laughs. “Why do you _always_ want to do the filthiest thing?”

Brian stills a little, in his frantic scrambling for lube. “Does it make you upset? That I’m—” he grimaces. “I know you don’t want me to say a slut.”

“Damn right I don’t,” Pat pets him. “You’re not a _slut_. You like to fuck, same as anybody. That doesn’t make me upset. Fuck, it’s a _gift_.”

The kid grins flirtily—he would flip his hair, probably, if they were both upright—and starts to get handsy—   

Pat hesitates, because he’s not good at fucking talking, but he owes it to the universe to fucking _try_. “I just worry you’re working too hard to try to keep me happy. Like, you don’t have to prove shit to me. You could turn me down every night for the rest of the year and my dick wouldn’t fall off.”

This garners him a sweet little hug and a kiss and a _sob_ , and fucking hell, why’s he always making this kid cry.

“Hey, hey, was that the wrong thing to say? Just to be clear, I’d also love to fuck you six times a day. I’m kinda open to whatever I get, here.”

“Sorry,” Brian murmurs, as Pat rubs his head with his fingertips. “I don’t—it’s not important.”

He taps the back of the kid’s skull. “Dish. What’re you crying about.”

“It’s stupid,” Brian nuzzles into his shoulder. “But when we first started dating I was trying _really, really_ hard.”

“Yeah, kid, I kinda got that. I couldn’t fucking figure out why, but now—” he pauses. “Maybe I kinda get it, now that I know. You probably thought the same thing about me that everyone else thinks.”

“What do they say about _you_ ,” Brian says breathlessly.

“All kinds of shit,” Pat scowls. “I deserve most of it. But I didn’t fucking pick you out.” Brian tightens a little. “I don’t mean it like _that_. I wanted to touch you as quick as I saw you. But I never wanted—I didn’t mean to—they think I went hunting for you. Like I saw weakness and pounced.” He pauses. “Fuck, maybe I did. I don’t know.”

Brian kisses into his collarbone. It’s soft and wet and gentle. “If anything, I picked _you_ out, Patrick. I thought—well, okay, this isn’t very nice.”

“Oho, now we get to the good shit. What’d you hear about _me_.”

“I heard you were an asshole,” Brian breathes. “All the Lems said so. That you dumped Roy _and_ fucked his roommate, too. And you screamed about having a hangover at some freshman girl’s _mom_. And you set off the fireworks in Dobson Hall. And you took molly at the aquarium. And you helped take all the doors in Fletcher. And you go to strip clubs with Ari. And you fucked a _professor_. And you nearly got arrested with Simone. And you poured oil in the philosophy turn-in box and ruined all the finals.”

“That last one wasn’t me,” Pat cuts in. “I wouldn’t’ve done that. I would have just cheated. I mean, it does have style though, so I’ll take it.”

Brian giggles.

“The rest is right. So which of these things, uh, made you…want to date me, exactly?”

Brian grins coyly. “All of them, as soon as I _saw_ you, daddy.” Pat laughs, and draws him close. “Seriously. I didn’t—okay, like, not a lot of people wanted to be around me, the first few weeks, okay? After what happened. I made people feel weird. Or angry. People were afraid to get me drinks. To be near me. And definitely no one wanted to _date_ me.” He scowls. “I mean, some people wanted a reenactment, but no one wanted to do much more than fuck me and post about it on facebook. Or call me a whore and pour milkshakes on me. Or whatever.”

Ah. Fuck. _Fuck_. Janet was in that pile of giggling sorority sisters who Driscoll’d been trying to impress. It’s all coming together. “God, people here are such trash.”

Brian dimples. “Yup. So when you…you were really like. Nice? And friendly? It meant a lot.”

“I am _not_ friendly.”

“Hah! You _were_ though. You were really nice and fun and you didn’t just try to get me in bed, either.”

“Brian, I literally put your sleeping ass in my bed.”

“You did,” Brian laughs. “Because you were _worried_ about me. Oh my god. I nearly died of joy, Pat Gill. I’d been flirting with you for weeks by then. You wouldn’t even grab my ass. I gave you so many opportunities.”

“Who the fuck grabs asses, kid, just because they’re nearby.”

“ _Plenty_ of people,” Brian says, rather grimly, but then his face breaks back into a smile. “But that’s why I liked you. And I thought you’d be…well, okay, I thought you’d be brave enough to fuck with me. Maybe even date. Even despite the rumors.”

“You were right about _that_ , at least,” Pat kisses his head. “I eat rumors for breakfast. It bums me out that you thought you had to be the horniest thing on two legs to keep me coming back, though.”

“Sorry,” Brian shrugs. “I just wanted to be sure I lived up to my reputation. In case that was a turn-on.”

“Well, your fucking face is a turn-on, kid, so just cool your jets. I’m sticking around.”

“You’re making me blush, Patrick, let’s fuuuuuck. I might put it on a little, but I really _do_ love to fuck. Promise promise. _A lot._ ”

Pat grins wickedly and rolls him over on his belly again. “All right, kiddo. Let’s see what your _bad boy_ boyfriend has in store for you tonight. Y’think Legs’ll forgive me, if she catches you with hickeys tomorrow?”

Brian shivers in delight, and teases. “I dunno. She doesn’t approve of you.”

“Oh, I know. She nearly clocked me, when she found you in my bed. Poor little helpless kid, can’t even _run away_ , and that fuck Patrick’s got him sprawled across his sheets. She told me to keep my fucking hands off you, you know that? Ages ago. I didn’t, of course, but she _did_ try to save you.”

A little silvery laugh. “Allegra’s silly. Did she really threaten you?”

“You bet your ass, kid. Then, and just now. She knows me. She knows if anything happens to you it’s me that she’s gotta come hold to account.”

“Let’s give her something to worry about then,” Brian arches his back eagerly, pressing Pat so far up that he touches the ceiling. “C’mon, you wanna mark me up? I’d _love_ that. Give me something that people can really stare at. I wanna be _limping_ tomorrow. Everyone already knows I like to fuck. And that you’re a jerk. Let’s keep our reputations up.”

“All right, baby boy,” Pat grins evilly. “You got it.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> BUGHOUSE IS SO FUN it's like realtime chess and it's good because you can pair weak players off with strong players. highly recommend.


	8. jarakhe fad hang

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> especial thanks to **riverblujay** again, for advisement on some ending things for this chapter and the next. 
> 
> warning: lots of arguing, violence, and discussion of noncon/dubcon. nothing too graphic

###  ** round 8. jarakhe fad hang.  **

(crocodile sweeps its tail) distract opponent into guarding the face.  
perform a spinning back kick to opponent's neck.

* * *

At lunch, the student center is crowded fucking chaos, but Brian wanted a BLT, so there they are.

“I’ll just be a sec!” Brian chirps, and darts away, wending effortlessly through the chattering masses with only the slightest hint of a stutter-step. This leaves Pat to poke around at lunch options that involve the least amount of social interaction—he’s had pizza twice this week, so after considering it for a long moment he settles on premade sushi. Brian doesn’t appear while he’s finding splintery chopsticks and a fake-wasabi packet, so Pat continues on to the register—Mona’s working, and he offers her a half-smile and a pathetically-pronounced _¿como estas?_ before wandering into the commons to scan for Brian’s bright-yellow shirt.

He spots him, finally, over near the booths. How the fuck he got so far so quick, Pat can only guess. Brian’s leaning against a wall, out of the way of person flow, tray in hand, talking to somebody. Pat heads toward him, threading through students and trays and tables and chairs with half-attention. The kid’s talking to—

holy _fuck—_

it’s _Franklin_.

Pat drops his tray on an empty table—a startled high-pitched _hey!_ suggests it might be occupied, actually, not empty, but fuck that—he’s already moving, muscling his way through anyone and everyone in between them.

If that fucker—

_there’s a goddamn smile on Franklin’s face—_

if that fucker touches him—

the kid’s body language is stiff but he’s not fleeing. They’re _talking_ , the two. And fuck if Pat can guess what he’s saying, but he’s not gonna get to finish saying it.

“Hey! Dipshit!” Pat barks, when he’s too far away to start a conversation at normal volume but definitely close enough that he looks up. “Get the hell away from him.”

It’s quick, how Frank’s face shifts from a smile into a sneer, and he starts to say “You’re not th—”

but he never gets the rest out, because Pat slugs him.

Pat throws a good hook, when he’s motivated. He steps forward and rotates his hips and slams right the fuck into Franklin’s jaw with all his fuckin’ might. The guy’s tall and broad and sturdy, but a sucker punch like that’ll take you right down, no matter who you are. He reels and ends up on the floor.

Brian swears and gasps—

a sharp little intake of breath that’s almost like a sob—

grabs Pat’s wrist—

there’s quite a bit of commotion already swirling around now—mostly people trying to get the hell away from the scene—but also some chattering and rubberneckers and all that bullshit.

Pat’s breathing heavy, but he plants his feet and glowers down and says, loud enough for anyone listening to hear. “You stay the _fuck_ away from him, you hear? Or I’ll cut your goddamn dick off.”

Franklin’s stumbling up. He’s on one knee and glaring, looking pissed but also maybe too dazed to do anything about it. Pat could give a fuck. He’d spit on him, if his mouth wasn’t dry with rage.

The yank on his sleeve is insistent, so he turns back to Brian, who’s staring up at him wide-eyed and looking goddamn terrified. “P-pat—”

Pat grabs his shoulder. The trembling pisses him off. Fuck Franklin, and fuck all this. “Cmon. Let’s get out of here. If we have to eat around this fucking rapist I’ll puke.”

He pushes Brian in front of him, to go—

honestly because he half-expects to be tackled from behind—

but the blow doesn’t come and they make it out of the student center without incident, except a lot of staring and whispers. Pat’s given a wide berth. It’s not terribly unusual, that. He throws a glance back, when he’s opening the door for Brian, but Franklin’s nowhere to be found.

* * *

Brian’s still shaking, when they get out in the open air. “Patrick—why’d you—you can’t just—in the middle of _everyone_ —”

“I can and I did.” The kid has his tray of food in hand, and Pat takes it from him. “Sorry I didn’t knock him clean out. I’m rusty.”

“I d-didn’t—how’d you— _why_ —”

Pat squeezes the sweaty hand, a quick silly attempt at comfort, and starts to walk. His heart’s still beating fast-uneven-heavy in his chest, and it makes his steps come fast too. He realizes after almost a minute that he’s nearly _dragging_ the kid along at this pace. He also realizes where he’s going—nods to himself. Yup, they can eat on the far side of campus, next to the fountain. It’s private. Nice. Space to breathe.

“ _Pat!_ ” the kid’s tugging, stopping—ah, _shit_. Brian’s pretty close to panic, clutching his own side like he’s got a stitch, or a bellyache—they’re together on that, then, how the wash of sloshing sudden tenseness curdles your insides—

“Pat— _stop._ That—that wasn’t good—what the _fuck_ —you’re gonna—he’s gonna—”

Pat sighs. “C’mon. Let’s just—let’s get somewhere to sit. You can eat, and then we’ll talk.”

“No!” Brian shakes his hand free, and his voice is sharp. “We’re talking _now_. What the fuck was that, Pat Gill.”

“Not a half of what he deserves,” Pat frowns mulishly.

“You can’t just—you can’t just _punch_ people—”

“I gave him a warning.”

“You did _not_.”

It grinds Pat’s guts, how _angry_ Brian looks. Yeah, he shouldn’t’ve—maybe—but what the fuck is he supposed to do? Just _let_ him?  “I did warn him. I told him to leave you the fuck alone. He opened his fat mouth to say no. I shut it for him.”

“ _Patrick._ He didn’t even—he didn’t _say_ anything to me—”

“Bullshit. I don’t care what he says. I’d do it again.”

“Pat! Please—”

Oh, _Jesus_. He’s—starting to cry. A quick cascade of tears, one after the other, wrenched out with no hitching or fanfare, just sliding chinwards from his scrunched-up face. Patrick casts his eye around quick, finds a bench to pull them toward. It’s not as private as he’d like but at least he can put the kid’s fucking lunch on it and let his heart rate spin down and turn to face his mistakes.

“I’m really sorry,” Pat says, gesturing toward the seat, dropping his gaze, because he’s not great at eye contact when he’s lying.

The kid doesn’t sit, though. Just stands, and stares, and his shoulders herk-jerk that way that seem to be jarring more tears out of him— _fuck_ —he’s really starting to—does he want—would a hand on his shoulder...be welcome...?

“He—he wasn’t b-bothering me...”

Brian curls his hands in his hair, pulls tight, as if the tension’s helping keep him together. Pat gives a curt nod, invites him to go on, ‘cause it seems like he’s gonna one way or the other.

“...he was just—said he hadn’t seen me around—all term. In-nvited me to a p-party.”

It might be anger, or fear, or terror, or frustration, that makes his voice like that, but there’s no _way_ that tone—that reedy-thin way it breaks on the syllables—is all and entirely about Pat.

“Were you gonna say yes?”

“ _No!_ ” Brian chokes out. “I said no. I don’t um. I don’t do parties. Too busy.”

“Good.” Pat reaches out a hand, nervously, like he’s gentling a spooked horse. “You did good. That was good. Perfect. Also feel free to tell him you’d rather he eat shit and die.”

“I wouldn’t.” Brian tilts his chin to the sky, as if gravity’ll do a better job keeping the tears in. “That’s not—I don’t say things like that, Pat.”

“Uh-huh.”

Not the most eloquent. He sucks up his courage and makes contact with Brian’s side, just fingertips. It isn’t pushed away. Pat feels out of his depth. There’s not usually a follow-up, to when he loses his temper. Usually it just happens—he blows up, he shoves off, and later there’s _consequences._ Usually he doesn’t regret a damn thing. Usually he’s not—forcing his slowing heart to shut the fuck up—forcing himself to string sentences together—apologies and explanations and other thoughtfulnessess that he’s useless at, really, even at the best of times.

“What if he gets you expelled, Pat.” Brian chokes out, dropping a hand from his ruffled hair to Patrick’s shoulder. “You punched him in—in the middle of lunch.”

Pat shrugs and shifts closer, pulls an arm around, grateful that the little hitching weepy sounds have stopped, and that he can press their hips together and beg for forgiveness with his touches rather than his stupid clumsy words.

“Look, kid, I’ll deal with it. I haven’t been expelled yet. And Franklin—” he pauses. Eyes the kid warily. “I know Franklin. He’ll be pissed. But he’s not gonna snitch.”  

“You think he’ll just let it go?” The glance down from the heavens is quick, hopeful.

Pat snorts. “Oh no, no way. But it won’t be the deans that sort this one out.”

No, Frank’s not gonna let that happen. They were never _friends_ , he and Franklin, but...they came up together, and campus is small enough that you get to know people, all right? Especially people with similar interests. Frank’s a charmer, and an asshole, and a drug dealer, and a boxer, and a smart fuck—Pat’s talked to him plenty, done homework with him, got high with him, argued with him even. He regrets ever fucking thinking that piece of shit was worth arguing with. He’s fucking scum.

Frank’s scum, but he’s not gonna _file a complaint._ That’s not how Fletcher does things. They’re bullheaded fucks and they’re proud of it. He’s not gonna snitch, and he’s also not gonna let Patrick get away with shit like that in the broad daylight.

Pat refocuses. Brian’s still panicking—scrabbling at him, a little—asking, begging—

“— _please—_ Pat—what do you mean—what does that _mean_ —”

“Don’t worry about it,” Pat strokes down his arm. “Really. I’m not getting expelled. That’s not—don’t worry. We’ll handle it, he and I.”  

Brian parses this, and jerks his head up. Pat feels kinda hopeful, because he's not crying anymore, but that’s shattered when he pushes Pat hard away from him and gives a little wrenching cry of angry grief.

“You’re gonna _fight_ him? What the _fuck_ —”

“I didn’t say that,” Pat mutters, but that’s not good enough, he knows—

“ _Are_ you?”

the kid’s pulling away, staring at him, daring him to deny it, wide-eyed. Pat runs a hand through his hair to mask how empty his fingers feel, now that they’re not touching Brian. He tries to decide whether lying now is better, or telling the truth—

the truth is that he doesn’t _want_ to fight Franklin, particularly, because Frank is out of his weight class, always was, has way more going for him than a couple years of muay thai and well-bruised shins, probably has _more_ going for him these days—

but well. The wheels have been set in motion. If Patrick had to bet—and he’s never been one for gambling—but well. He’d advise the kid to invest a few bucks with Simone. Not on who’s gonna win, that’s fuckin’ stupid. Just a side pot, maybe, on how long it’s gonna take. Patrick’s probably got a few more rounds in him than the average fuckwit might guess.

“You _maniac_ ,” Brian’s voice is horror-soft, at Pat’s extended silence.

“Sorry.”

“You can’t—I won’t let you—you can’t _fight_ him, Patrick, he didn’t do anything wrong—”

“Don’t you fucking give me that _._ He raped you, Brian, and don’t you _dare—_ ”

he cuts himself off sharp, because that tone is wrong, wrong, really really wrong, not the right tone to use with your crying boyfriend—

“...what _,_ Pat? Don’t you dare _what_?”

Brian’s rocking into his space, arms wrapped around himself, looking livid-pale, shaking, face screwed up like he wants to flee or scream or maybe crumple to the ground. It’s fucked, that Patrick can make the kid look like that. This isn’t what he meant to happen. It’s never fucking—

“Bri—” he hesitates, voice catching, not sure what to do with his hands—

the kid’s so fuckin’ worked up. He’s near shouting. “You weren’t there. You’ve got no—I’m not _lying_.”

The way he spits that word burns Patrick like a radiation blast, blinds him like a flash grenade. He’s said that before. Of all the things Brian’s called—and he gets called a _lot_ of things, nasty fucking things that don’t happen within earshot of Patrick because it’s gone around now that if such a thing were to happen there’d be bloody noses at least—but of all the things, Pat knows that Brian hates being called a liar the most.

And yet. And _yet._ Pat can’t just—he can’t fucking let this go—

“No,” Pat says, flat. “You’re not lying. But you’re not right, either.”

There’s a break, in Brian’s breathing. Not teary. Craggy asperous asymmetrical lengths of air, like he’s half-ready to cry and half-ready to yell and mastering it, inelegantly. Pat can relate to that.

“Stop it,” he finally blurts out. “I have to go to friggin’ class. Why can’t you just—why are you so—”

“I’m an asshole.” Pat answers, ashamed. Brian’s already—he’s already winding it down, tying it back, his expression, his tears, the heavy breaths. It’s coming back together. Just holding himself, squeezing hard, trembling, a few wayward tears, and the rocking and he’s—recentering, scrambling back up to some kind of baseline, so he can go take color-coded notes or whatever. How the fuck does he _do_ that.

“Patrick.”

“I’m a real son of a bitch. Ask anyone. I told you you’re too good for me. I told you what I am.”

The kid wipes his nose on his sleeve and sighs and lets go of himself and shifts his weight—

presumably to make a quick exit—

but actually, no. No, he takes three steps forward, and grabs Pat’s shirt, drags him down a half-a-foot and _kisses_ him, fiercely. It’s wet and messy and it _hurts_ and it sparks a wave of relief like a bucketful of ice water through Pat’s whole body. Suddenly he’s damp with sweat and prickling with goosebumps and curling his arm around the kid’s waist with gentle disbelief.

“I know what you are,” Brian murmurs, voice not edgeless but softer, at least. “And I know you’re—trying to protect me—and you’re _crazy_ —and I’m still mad at you—”

Pat kisses him again, just in case, and Brian allows it, allows Pat’s tongue to find forgiveness in his willing mouth, to press against him. The kid tastes like sweat and tears, hot and pale and scowling-scared and still willing to let himself be touched, for whatever reason.

“—I’m still mad,” he breaks away, and breathes in air for a little hysterical laugh, “and worse, I gotta go to stats now. I’ve got a quiz about factorial ANOVAs.”

“Too fucking smart for me, too,” Pat mutters, and Brian groan-laughs and drags his hand in Pat’s dark hair, pulling it harder than usual but not with malice.

“Well if I’m late I’m _fucked_ —I’ve got to _go_ Pat—I’ve got to go to class—unless I get fucking arrested for battery on the way there—”   

Pat kisses him, again. Just… just in case. “Okay, kid. Go. Take your fuckin’ lunch with you, at least.”

Brian grabs it, and his backpack, and checks his watch, and grimaces. He glances up, wasting another second, though. “ _Please_ promise me you won’t go looking for trouble. At least not until I get back.”

“I promise,” Patrick nods solemnly. “If the cops show up, say I’m in the library. That’ll throw ‘em off. ”

“I _hate_ you,” Brian’s face breaks into a laugh despite himself, and he shoves Pat, then pauses once more to kiss him, then runs off, hair scattered wild and gait half-limping like a maimed gazelle.

* * *

Whenever Pat’s not with Brian, he’s alone, give or take. Sometimes he’s in class—not _that_ often—and of course sometimes he’s bugging Simone at caf, and sometimes he’s having a cigar with the critical theory fucks on the roof of Ridley. But really, he spends most of his time either with Brian or alone.

He budgets a bit of aloneness, that week. Brian doesn’t _say_ that he needs some space, but anybody’d get withdrawn after that display of disastrous problem-solving, and the kid’s no exception. Goes quieter than usual. Holds back. Pat takes that as his cue. Bri’s forgiving, but he probably needs a couple days to hang with the girls and let the gossip peter out and ask Legs for advice about whether _this whole thing_ is really a good idea.

Pat knows what she’ll say, but he hopes against hope the kid won’t listen.

He figures he’s got a good chance, actually. Brian doesn’t seem like the type to dump a guy for one rash fit of temper. Of course, the temper’s just the latest in the series of—well, a long list of well-documented faults—the smoking and the scowling and the cheating and the lying and the being a nasty fuck to everyone, but especially custies. But Brian’s never blinked an eye at those, not really. Maybe he’ll decide to double down even now that he knows his scrawny-skinny greasy-haired ghostly-pale asshole boyfriend can, actually, throw a punch. And does, from time to time.

But anyway. He keeps his distance. Doesn’t bug him about coming over, figures the kid can set the pace. He knows where Patrick lives. It frays his nerves a little, when he keeps clear over the weekend, but fair enough. They’ve got caf together on Tuesday, so Pat resolves to pin the kid down then about whether they’re okay, or whether—

well. Whether he’s gotta take himself off the caf schedule for the rest of the year and ask Beth again if it’s too late to fuckin’ transfer or at least take Justin up on that standing offer of _all the moonshine you can drink but also it’s not my fault if you go blind just so you know._

Anyway, the point is. A few days without Brian—

without the kid climbing all over him and humming songs and quipping jokes and forcing him to make outlines and rewarding him for turning in his homework on time like he’s a fuckin six-year-old—

(although he’s fairly sure it’d be illegal to reward six-year-olds like _that_. Poor little fucks have to make do with gold stars.)

—a few days without Brian should be a chance to get some work done, to concentrate. But it just ain’t so. Pat realizes when he finishes a paragraph, looks up, that he’s looking pointlessly for Brian’s approval—has just turned around like a panting lapdog, waiting for pets. He scowls and slams his laptop shut in annoyance. Fucking _shit_.

So instead, when his mind is blocked that weekend, he indulges one of his less productive hobbies—long walks. They clear his head, kinda. He tends to go around the edge of campus, wanders out into the neighborhoods, across the construction sites, across the off-campus housing and loops back to smoke a cigarette on the lawn of the president’s house, just because he can. It’s a nice little circuit, long enough to let you really procrastinate. He does it, he finds, at least once a day.

* * *

Somewhere in one of those lonely walks, they find him.

“Get _up_ , bitch,” Todd barks.

“You don’t like me better on the ground?” Pat coughs. He’s smarting, but he’s also _pissed_.

“What’s that supposed to mean.”

Todd’s not much for jokes. He’s just sneering ugly, like his presence is a threat. Hah. A real fuckin’ tough guy, Todd, even though Frank’s foot has done the only work so far. Just enough to knock him down. That might be all he wants.

But it’s not all Pat wants, actually.

“Sorry I’m not fuckin’ _drunk_ enough for you, Toddy,” Pat mocks. “Get your fuckin’ lackey to knock me out first, then I bet you’ll be able to get your dick up.”

Todd makes a strangled sound of rage and steps in just just close enough, curling his stupid fists. Pat laughs out loud. This poncy _fuck_ isn’t gonna take a swing, doesn’t even know _how_ —

Pat kicks out a leg and loops it ‘round and Todd goes crashing to the ground with a screech. Oh, it feels _good_ , that does, really fucking good, and if he’s quick—ooh, he lands an elbow, yes you _cock_ —if he’s quick maybe he can get in a solid punch to that toothy face before—

 _shit_.

Frank kicks _hard_ , a heel to the shoulder blade that sends Pat sprawling, he catches himself, on his hands, not bad, but then, an immediate steel-toe to the stomach, _fuck_ , Jesus, a nice hard kick to put him down and keep him there, it works of course, Pat curls, grunts, draws in his arms and knees, because the next one’s going to _suck_ —

but nothing else comes. No more kicks. Just Franklin’s voice.

“Don’t be a fucking idiot, Patrick,” he grumbles. Fucker doesn’t even sound like he’s breathing heavy. “Stop it before you start bleeding.”

“Maybe punching—you fucks—is worth it.” Stupid. Stupid thing to say, while he’s still curled on the ground and gasping for air. He’s permitted to get his stupid breath back, though, while that prick Todd scrambles, swearing, to his feet.

“I’m gonna—you greasy little _shit_ — ”

ugh. Todd’s screechy and entirely worthless. Pat shoves up to his hands and knees and contemplates—worth it to hit him again? And then run for it? That’d be _glorious_ , but—well. Todd’s on the track team. And even a totally worthless stupid fucking weak-ass dickwit can figure out how to tackle you from behind. And then Frank would catch up. And the two of them together could do a pretty workmanlike job, if they really made an effort.

Through all this calculation, Todd’s _still_ shouting like an idiot. “You can’t just—Gill you piece of _shit_ —your ass is _fucked_ —”   

“Then make sure you get my good side for snap,” Pat spits. “Wanna look good for the deposition.”

“That’s—you—shut the fuck _up_ —” Todd is hopping around like an angry rabbit, and looking like he wants to kick Pat in the face but he’s too scared to get close enough. Calculations aside, Pat finds himself hoping—

_cmon you cunt, bring your foot over here—let’s see your head bounce off the pavement again—_

he doesn’t approach, though. And Franklin’s just standing.

Pat sneers. “Well, Frank? You done here? Or is this just the fuckin’ foreplay.”

“I dunno what Gilbert’s been telling you,” Franklin says, quietly. “But he’s lying.”

Pat feels a rushing in his ears, a prickling in his lips, but he keeps it together, keeps himself to a growl. “ _Fuck_ you. You’re dumber than I thought. There’s fucking _video_ of you screwing him.”

Frank gestures. “We screwed, but he wanted it.”

Pat’s hands twitch—

_stay on your knees, Patrick, don’t get up, if you get up you’re gonna hit him, and then—_

“How dumb do you have to fucking be, Frank, to _tape it_ when you rape someone?”

Todd inserts himself. “We didn’t _rape_ him, Gill, Brian fucking _begged_ for my dick. Like I’m sure he does with you—you’ll feel different when he moves on to the next senior cock he can ride— _fuck!”_

Pat aims wrong, which is disappointing, but at least he makes _some_ kind of contact with Todd’s person, enough to garner a hearty _oof_ before Franklin’s tangling with him again.

They struggle for a minute, pulling hair and arms and jabbing and bony elbows and meaty fists and thin waist and thick neck and scraping on gravel and inarticulate shouting—

they’re not even really trying to hurt each other—

Patrick’s just trying to get his hands on Todd, and Franklin’s stopping him.

“Either hit me,” Pat gets out, a strangled cry against the arm around his neck, “Or let me hit him, Frank, you _cunt_ —you used to have a fucking decent bone in your body.”

He’s ignored.

“Cool it, Todd,” Frank mutters. “You rile him up and we’ll never get this settled.”

“I told you how to settle it, Frank,” Todd whine-sneer-sniffs, a pretentious expression that would be fucking beautiful to wipe off his face. “But you were like ‘ _oh no, god forbid that maniac gets expelled and solves all our problems’ ”._

“I’m not a _narc_.” The tone is flat and pissed, and punctuated by a shove—Pat manages not to hit the ground with his face, but it’s a close thing. “And I’m not a fuckin’ rapist, Patrick. Stop spewing that shit around school. Get your ass up and face me like a man. Todd’ll stay out of it.”  

Ah. Yeah, that makes sense. He wonders if Frank really wants to punch this all the way the fuck out, or if he just wants to put something on Pat’s face that’s ugly enough tomorrow that everyone knows its sorted—

probably the latter, actually, Fletcher and their _reputations_ and _honor_ and _pride_ and dick-swinging shit like that—

wouldn’t be _so_ bad—he could probably get a coupla good swings in before Frank feels like he’s done—

but Brian won’t like that much, probably—

“Get _up_.” Franklin repeats.

“Why,” Pat goads. “What do I get if I stay on my knees? Maybe I’ll like that better.”

“You threw a haymaker at me out of _nowhere_ , you cocksucker.” Franklin barks. “You fight like a dirty little bitch. So get up and take your medicine.”

Pat doesn’t, though. He should, maybe. He doesn’t know what Brian would prefer. It’s hard to—to clear his head enough—to figure it out. Brian doesn’t want him to fight this out, he’d been clear about that. Is it the principle of the thing? Or is it just that he doesn’t want his erstwhile-boyfriend covered in bruises? ‘Cause the ship’s probably fuckin’ sailed on the last one—

actually, hard to say. Hard to know how bad they’d kick the shit out of him, if he didn’t fight back at all. If he just lay on the ground and took it. Maybe it’d just be one punch, tit-for-tat, and that’s it. Maybe Frank would put him in the hospital. He wouldn’t _think_ so, but—there’s a lot of things he wouldn’t’ve thought that Franklin would do—

“Get the fuck _up_.” Franklin’s tone has that dangerous edge. He gets like that sometimes, when he’s angry or he’s just a little too drunk.

Patrick finds himself darkly interested in the latter possibility. What if they _did_ —

“No one’s watching, Frankie,” Pat ugly-grins up at him, taunting, pushing. “No reason to pretend. Why don’t you get Todd to hold my arms, ey? Make sure I stay still, that’s how you like it. You’re gonna have to break my jaw to get your ugly fuckin’ cock in my mouth, but I’m sure you could do it.”

There’s a moment—

a _hell_ of a moment—

where Patrick really can’t read Franklin’s face at all. He looks—well, about to lose it, more or less, but there’s something _else_ there. It could be—a lot of things. Pat doesn’t guess. Whatever it is, it passes, and Frank doesn’t rise to the bait, and Pat doesn’t give in.

“Get up, Pat,” he grates out. “Or beg for mercy if you’re such a pussy you can’t take a fat lip.”

Pat laughs bitterly. “I won’t, you sick son of a bitch. This isn’t a fucking _game_. Please, beat the shit out of me. I’d love a reason to go to the cops. He’s not gonna. But I will.”

Frank makes a frustrated face, like he’s been out-maneuvered, like he’s not sure what to do, now. Todd’s receded into the distance, watching their exchange with his stupid beady eyes and his arms folded.

“You—I didn’t fucking _rape_ him, Patrick. Get it in your head. He’s lying to you.”

“He didn’t say shit, Frank,” Pat hisses. “I saw the video. ”

An exasperated gesture. “I’m not—you’ve never fucked drunk, Pat? _Ever?_ Never had that little frosh suck your dick after he’s had a few?”

“It’s not the fuckin’ same.”

“The cops’d say it was.”

Pat shrugs. “Fine. Let’s both hang for it, then. I’m not gonna stop saying it.”

They glare, stalemated, for a long moment—

but fucking Todd butts in, that whiny-loud commanding voice. Fucking _fuck._ Everything would be easier if Todd were just _stupid_. But he’s not quite.

“All right, boys. Let’s cut the crap.”

“Shut up, you shit,” Pat growls. “Grown-ups are talking.”

“Here’s how I see it—” Todd’s ignoring him “—all this discussion is _bullshit_. You apparently don’t care about the truth, or getting your ass beat, or being expelled, or whathaveyou. Therefore you’re useless for negotiation. We only have two points of contention—”

He sticks up his fingers, counts on them, like he’s doing a fucking debate team speech. Pat reconsiders his newfound commitment to pacifism.     

“—one. You are making _inaccurate_ and _defamatory_ accusations about us. We want you to stop—”

oh my fucking Jesus Christ this fuck could Franklin _really_ blame him for just one more—

“—two. Your _blatant_ disinterest in your personal security and reputation makes this effectively an ultimatum game—”

_holy Mary mother of God grant me patience to not punch this fuck in the dick—_

“—which means we need to change the parameters, Franklin. Or we can’t win. Fortunately, if we expand the universe of discourse to include the only thing that Gill apparently cares about, we can renegotiate.”

The blood in Pat’s veins is boiling. “What’re you even _saying_.”

“Let me say it again, _slower_ , because I know you failed polysci the first time.” Todd’s voice slides into that familiar taunting register. “You say that shit again, and Gilbert’ll be sorry for it.”

Jesus. Fucking Christ. This piece of shit—

it was always that way, with Todd, that manipulative _fuck_ —

“This is it, Frank?” Pat gets out, although he’s still looking at Todd. “This is what you’ve come to?”

Franklin glances at Todd, and back down to Patrick. His face is ugly. Gruff. Decided. “Yeah. If he’s fucking you, he should know he’s courting trouble.”

“That’s fucking disgusting,” Pat breathes. “How could you—he’s just a _kid._ ”

“Gilbert’s not _innocent_. He’s a player. He’ll ditch you when he figures out you’re causing him grief.”

Patrick closes his eyes. This one hurts, because at the moment, it feels just shy of true. “You’re _filth_.”

“We’re _fair_ ,” Todd says, stuck-up self-important prick that he is. “It’s tit-for-tat, Patrick.”

“And the way I see it,” Frank grates out, and he sounds so much _crueller_ than he used to, way back when. “You’re one ahead on the count. So tell your boyfriend to watch his back.”

  
 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> guys this chapter had so many emotions i hope something worked out i rewrote it a LOT


	9. dunsany's

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **riverblujay** helped with everything good about this chapter, and also caught me misspelling the word _jeans_ jesus h christ.
> 
>  
> 
> this chapter contains a lot of explicit (consensual) sex and also some philosophy no one asked for

###  ** round 9. dunsany's.  **

an asymmetrical chess variant. black has a standard setup. white has 32 pawns.  
black seeks to capture all the pawns. white seeks to checkmate the black king.

* * *

It fucking sucks, finding Brian in Lemelson the next day. Pat slouches to the door like a naughty child expecting to be turned away. It’s okay if he is. He just needs Brian to know how much he screwed up.

Brian cracks the door, and sees Pat, and smiles. “Hey Pat! Jenna’s here—”

“Hey kid. That’s all right. Not lookin’ to stay. Just had some more apologizing to do.”

“Let’s hear it!” Jenna chirps from within, and Brian pulls the door wider so Pat can slip inside. She waves. She’s spread out over the floor, over a half-dozen binders and a couple cans of some vile blue energy drink—they were probably doing homework together, something that Patrick’s interrupting.  

Pat drags a hand through his hair. Doesn’t know whether to start in or not, with her there. But she doesn’t seem like she’s leaving, so maybe he’s lost the right to have a private audience.

“Uh. Brian. You already fuckin’ know I’m trouble, but—” no, no, that’s not the right way to start, that’s very _stupid_ , he’s already done that bit— “I’m sorry I lost it, the other day.”

“It’s okay, Pat,” Brian takes his hand, rather gently. His little face is so fucking _earnest_ , hair curling around his temples, faint echo of blue circles under heavy-lidded eyes, chin sharp and delicate, nose cute as a button. Oh my god, what Frank could do to that face. “I’m—I’m over it actually—I was worried that you—”  

“ _Please_ don’t forgive me,” Pat closes his eyes and ekes out, voice rasping. “Please. You don’t know the half of it.”

“Are you in trouble?” The fingers grabbing his hand tighten, climb up his wrist, pull him, as if they could by pulling elicit an answer faster.

“Yeah. Not with admin though.”  

A hiss of relief. Some shuffling papers—Jenna packing up, probably, figuring out that this conversation isn’t gonna be the _fun_ kind of apology.

Pat goes on anyway. “Frank didn’t like hearing what he was. Todd neither. Goddamn _cowards_.”

Brian sucks in air. “Did they— _Pat,_ did they hurt you?”

“No, no. Nothing like that. They know they can’t—” a gruff laugh fractures his sentence “—they can’t figure out how to hurt me.”  

Something pushes at him, a hand, a little faint _‘scuse,_ slips behind, then the door’s open and shut and Jenna’s gone, presumably. Pat finds himself wishing she’d stayed. He’ll need to tell her—or Legs, or just every half-decent Lem he can—to watch the kid’s back.

“—so if they didn’t—why do you—Pat—how’re you in trouble…?”

“ _You’re_ in trouble,” Pat says, simply. “ ‘Cause you’re the only thing I’ve got that’s worthwhile.”

“What...does that mean?” Patrick risks a look at the kid. He’s—still confused, mostly. Staring wide-eyed. Nervous.

“It means you better dump me soon.” It hurts to say, but he gets it out.

His face shifts, almost wry. “Patrick, I’m not—”

“I mean it. You need to do it. In public. And it better be _savage_. That’d put you in the clear, I reckon.”

“ _No!_ That’s stupid—”

“Yes.” He makes his face as stern, as fierce, as angry as he possibly can. “I’m not gonna have you get your ass beat.”

“I don’t care what they do,” Brian frowns, stubbornly adorable, and sweetly loyal, and so desperately, terribly fragile. “I don’t care.”

“ _I_ care. And you—” he sighs, tries to detach the hand clutching his forearm bruising-tight. “You’ve never even been punched, I bet. What’ve we got, like, four months left, tops? It’s over, Brian. Just cut and run. We’re done.”

“ _No_ ,” Brian repeats. “I’ll—I don’t care—I’ll—” he pulls Pat in for a teary hug that is so hard around the ribs that Pat yelps in unexpected pain. “Pat! You said—you’re _hurt_ —”

“An old bruise, kid,” Pat grunts, detangling himself. “One spot. You’ve got aim like a fuckin’ sniper.”

Brian cry-laughs, at that, and hugs Patrick again more gently, and then collapses into tears, shaking his head, saying _no no no_ faintly like he can’t quite get over the facts. Too bad. He’s gotta get it. He’s gotta sort the fact that the honeymoon is over, here. That Pat is a fucking doomsday clock, and he’s finally ticked down.

“I’m sorry, kid,” Pat says, and means it this time, means it so badly, even though he’s more sorry for himself maybe than he even is for Brian. “This was—good. So good. The best fuckin’ thing that’s happened to me. I couldn’t—I couldn’t have—”

“Stop it,” Brian sobs into his shoulder. “Stop it, you asshole.”

“—look, Brian, it’s a real—I know this isn’t how it should—just fucking— _please_ stop crying—” he stops, breaks. If he’s gonna make this work he should probably say some mean shit, but he can’t, he just can’t, he doesn’t even know what would _work_ to send Brian running. He’s the most wonderful thing Pat’s ever had his hands on and Pat’s not even smart enough to fuck it up. He settles on just: “It’s over. Whatever you like about me, it’s not worth it.”

“Shut up,” Brian pulls up, kisses his chin. “Fuck you. I’m not letting you break up with me.”    

“Don’t think you can stop me, kid,” Patrick says, but it’s not confident, like he’d like. Not smooth and wry and flat. It cracks in the middle, and Brian’s got a hand curled under his shirt, mouth pressed into his neck, and Pat’s been preparing himself to get over this for three-and-a-half days, to let the kid move on and go fit perfectly onto someone else’s shoulder, someone who’s not gonna put tears in his eyes and bruises on his knees and ugly rose-red scratches all down his porcelain skin.

Brian responds by _biting_ him—

he starts a little, in shock—

he’s being shouldered, stumbling just a couple-steps back into the built-in wardrobe—

 _“Kid_ —”

he hits the door hard, and Brian fuckin’ _pins_ him, pushes, right into that stupid goddamn bruise with disarming accuracy and other hand into Pat’s neck like he means real business—

Pat swallows the instant urge to shove him off, because—

well, he _could_ shove him—

but if the kid is angry and fierce and adamant that they be touching and Pat is angry and sullen and adamant that they be not, then he knows what’s going to happen next in this room is a fight. Not a cute one. Not a lover’s quarrel. Not something that’s settled by decibels. And some of the rumors about Patrick aren’t true, but some _are_ , and he knows he’d win this one, too.

“Listen to me Pat Gill.” Brian’s breath hits Pat’s face in little airy puffs. “I’m not breaking up with you, you cock. _And_ I’m coming over tonight. And if you dump me fine but I’m gonna tell everyone I’m still fucking you anyway so you can just—just—stick _that_ in your pipe and smoke on it.”   

“You’re an idiot,” Pat says, matter-of-factly.

“I don’t care,” Brian repeats, for the third time, and it’s thready but not hysterical. “What can they do? They’ve already—I already—they’re not gonna _kill_ me, Pat.” He laughs, and okay, that’s traipsing closer to hysterical.

“They can beat the shit out of you, kid,” Patrick sighs. “Or make your life hell. I’ve seen it happen before. You’re gonna regret this.”

“I’m not. I’m not like Frank and you. I’m not afraid of _snitching_ —”

Patrick winces, to be reminded, how very much they’re alike—

“—if they hurt me I’ll _tell someone_ and they’ll get in trouble and that’s it.”

“Good,” Pat says, and means it, although he wants to explain—

“Shut up.” Brian sets his chin and pushes harder, clever little fingers right into Pat’s guts, daring him to move. He doesn’t. “I don’t want to hear it, Pat. ‘Cause I’m decided. I know how rumors work. No one on campus is gonna believe that we’re not still fucking. I’ll make sure. So your move.”

He does sound decided.

Quite decided, to go down with this stupid-ass ship. Decided to ensure that there’s nothing Pat can do to save him. God, he’s so fucking stupid. It makes Pat’s heart throb with—

well, it should be frustration, but it’s pride—

the kid’s so goddamn clever, and his eyes are shining with watery-bravery, and his hands let go of their grip but don’t stop touching, wrists move to Pat’s shoulders, hands clasp behind his neck. Holding him there. Hanging on for dear life. Daring him to try and get away.

Yeah, Pat feels proud, for some reason. Kinda the feeling he got the first time the kid won a game of chess without Patrick secretly throwing it. He slides his useless hands onto Brian’s hips. ‘Cause if the kid’s so dead-set on jumping overboard, they might as well go down together.

“You’re makin’ a mistake, Bri.”

“I _love_ making mistakes,” Brian presses closer, at the invitation. “I’m really good at it.”

“All right, then.”  

* * *

“Y’think Jenna’s coming back tonight?” Pat asks, as they get ready for bed. It’s still a little uneasy, settling back to baseline, moving around each other, after the past hour. But they’re managing. It’s easier than Pat might have thought.

“No,” Brian ducks his head. “She texted me. She, uh, said if you were gonna spend the whole night _apologizing_ that’d be okay.”

“Ah. Remind me to apologize to her too.”

“Don’t do that, you’ll make me jealous,” Brian smirks, and jumps up into the loft.

“Fucking stop that, kid, you’re gonna hurt yourself,” Pat grouses. It can’t be good for his goddamn ankle, balancing on the desk to reach the windowsill to step over the air conditioner to shimmy up into the hole in the loft. “Where the fuck is your ladder, anyway.”

“ _—takes up too much space_!” comes Brian’s muffled voice, from above, and then his head is peeking out, mischievous. “We put it in the basement. Everyone does it.”

“Lems are idiots,” Pat grouses, as he clambers up himself. “If you need more space, get rid of some of these goddamn books _._ ”

“I prefer not to. Break my ankles if you have to, but leave me my Melville.”

“You just like having a library that says DICK in it.”

“Yes,” Brian giggles. “There’s also that.”

It’s fucking _hot_ up in the loft, stuffy, so Pat strips off his shirt. Which of course is taken as an invitation, so they get into the canoodling quick. Brian’s wiggly as an eel and moans and sighs whenever he’s touched; Pat’s animated with dark desire that isn’t much tempered by the burn of guilt—he resolves to just give up, give in, let himself take and take and take the kid down with him, as he was maybe always going to do.

Eventually, Bri flips around on his belly and they really start going, Pat sliding in fast but never fast enough for the kid’s wanton little whines of need. He’s _raucous_ , tonight, delighted at every movement, and Pat leans tight over his body and jerks in hard, seeking whatever will stand in for absolution.

Brian presses upward with his hips, his shoulders, eager-seeking more. There’s so little clearance up here that it jams Pat up into the ceiling. Normally that’s fine—hot, even—the greedy bucking punctuating their sex with smacks of obstacle—deterrent subverted—the close-pressed reminder that _we really shouldn’t be doing this and definitely not here_ —it’s just the cherry on top of a nice rough-fuckin’ sundae. Usually.

But today it’s more of an annoyance, where it grinds into Pat’s shoulderblades, the echoes of Frank’s boot on his back. He grimaces, but carries on—the pain’s quite tolerable, easy, nothing—it just draws his thoughts away, is the thing. Out of the moment, out of appreciating the tender thing he’s got below him, out to the edge of campus last night in the fading twilight and the gravel grinding into his palms and Frank’s forearm cutting into his windpipe and Todd’s foul evil-cunning smirk and pain and fear and dread and—

he presses himself up a little, harder, pushes into the bruise, erodes those wayward thoughts with the ache. Brian’s sweaty and squirming and _beautiful_ , and Pat resolves to make this good. It’s useful, maybe, his distraction. Gives him some endurance. He’s often too overwhelmed with enthusiasm, too horny and stupid to delay his building need, too self-centered to think with anything but his cock. Tonight he can take his time, even pressed up against the dormitory ceiling, can dedicate himself to rolling his hips just right, to finding the pattern and place and pressure that unwinds the kid’s moans, makes them trail off into stuttering sobs.

He knows that Brian likes a hand snaking around his throat—not pulling, just stroking, possessive. He knows to grip his hair and jerk his head around, to pin down the thin wrist, to put the little body at his mercy. He knows to touch as much as possible. The kid whines beautifully when his hand drags, slow and unfaltering, down his belly and ends wrapped around his cock.

“Beg me,” he breathes out, husky and wet, in Brian’s ear.

“ _P-please,_ ” he buckles immediately, twisting his head to mouth against Pat’s face. “Oh, _please—_ ”

“Not good enough,” Pat goads, and slows his pace.

Brian’s usually good at begging—he says _filthy_ shit, absolutely obscene, about what he wants and what he is and what he can take and who will hear it—spits out promises and protests on semi-automatic fire—but tonight he seems a bit at a loss. Just pants like a dog, and whimpers.

“ _God_ , Pat—” he finally groans out, at once low- and high-pitched, like a rusty hinge. “You’re—I—”

“I’d threaten to stop,” Pat murmurs into his throat, “but you know I won’t, don’t you.”

“ _Don’t_ stop,” Brian echoes, and trails off into another gasp.

Pat smiles. He could get used to this. Maybe he needs to fuck up his back more often. He’s gripping tight, and he can _feel_ the kid trying not to come, the desperate tremors and frissons of muscles, the agony of hot desired release beating up against the doors of his resistance.

“So good for me,” he praises, and shifts his weight, and bites at Brian’s neck, and the kid comes, unexpectedly, in Pat’s insistent fist—no warning, just inarticulate sounds and sudden bonelessness.

Pat laughs and pulls out, turns them. Brian’s sweaty and limp and Patrick does his best to reach under and around without breaking contact, to clean him up with a fistful of tissues, his chest against Brian’s spine. It’s even warmer in the loft now, truly muggy, and the kid is _burning_ with pink-hued heat, but Pat doesn’t draw away from an inch of skin, just presses fervent whiskered kisses to the wet curls of his neck and draws out little exhausted sighs.

It’s several minutes before Brian stirs, sleepy-sated. “Why’d you—you didn’t finish—you don’t have to stop. I can take more.”

Pat squeezes his arm. “Shhh. I’m good. Dunno if _I_ can take more.”

“That’s not—why?”

“Shoulder’s acting up,” Pat admits, for some reason, maybe just because the arm’s pinned beneath the kid’s limp weight and the truth of it’s becoming increasingly hard to forget.

“I’ll give you a massage, if you want,” Brian’s voice brightens, moves quicken, animated. “Let me—”

“Nah, nah, kid it’s fine. Just let me hold you—”

But Brian’s already slithering free, trying to turn them into some semblance of the opposite position.

“No, no, I’m pushing on you,” he’s rolling sleepily. “At least let me be big spoon then.”

Pat murmurs his acquiescence, because thought he _wants_ to, he doesn’t think he can manage falling asleep with his arm caught up under like that. He rolls over, in some relief, because he doesn’t think, because he’s a fucking idiot—

“Holy _shit_ , Pat,” Brian breathes. Ah, fuck. “You said they didn’t hurt you.”

“I lie sometimes,” Pat mutters, embarrassed.

The kid’s fingers trace delicately along his scapula, parallel lines. “Someone _kicked_ you. Franklin?”

Pat would groan, if he weren’t so goddamn tired. “It’s nothing. They just—I’m a dumbass. Todd was pissing me off on purpose and I couldn’t sit there and take it. Frank just wanted me down. He didn’t follow up.”

“Are you still lying,” Brian says softly.

“No,” he says, although honestly, he’s not really sure. He pauses. “Maybe. What do you want to know?”

“Did you fight him?”

“No. He just knocked me down, and told me to get up and face him like a man. I didn’t. Really threw him for a loop, that one.”  

Brian’s stroking a hand through Pat’s hair. It’s nice, even though he’s normally not one for people touching his head. “Thank you. For not—not doing that. ”

Pat laughs humorlessly. “Oh, I still fucked it up, kid. Ran my big mouth. That’s why they’re gunning for you. I shoulda just done it.”

“I don’t want you to get hurt,” Brian insists, tugging a little, to punctuate his words.

“I’m good at getting hurt. You shoulda seen my shins when I was in muay thai.” He snorts. “Or my face, when I was in middle school. I’ve had worse.”

“Is that how you learned to punch.”

“Muay thai, yeah. You don’t punch a lot. But you learn how to throw a good one. You’re only gonna get _one_ , so.”

“Hmm,” Brian muses thoughtfully. “Maybe I should sign up. Practice getting my ass beat.”

Pat smiles a little at the thought. “They don’t start wailing on you day one, kid. And nah, it’s not worth it. You wouldn’t take to it.”

“I can learn physical stuff,” Brian taps him, gently. “I do dance, Pat. I’m flexible.”

“Oh, I know that. So save your injuries for dance, all right? Leave the brawling to the hooligans. It’s never done me any fuckin’ good, except getting people to want to punch me.” He pauses. “Or actually, that might just be my face.”

Brian laughs. “The mouth part, mostly.”

Pat shifts. “How’s dance going. Easing back in?”

“Yeah. I’m marking. I really—” Brian sighs. “I really miss jumping. Like, _really_ jumping. It’s still too wonky to land on. I could probably—”

“Don’t.” Pat says sharply. “You’ll fuck yourself up. Just go slow.”

“I have a hard time going slow,” he admits. He’s pressing into Pat’s head with his fingertips, massaging, not-too-forcefully, but with strength. It feels so _nice_. Pat hadn’t even realized he had a headache, but now he can already feel the tension starting to ease. “I always want to move quick before I lose the chance.”

“At the risk of calling the kettle black,” Pat murmurs, “try not to be a reckless asshole.”

Brian laughs.

“I mean it.” It’s hard to be serious, with the scratching—makes him feel oddly kittenish. “You’re fucking smart. Think about what you’re doing. Count to ten. Don’t end up with trashed knees and enemies and no one to complain to about it.”

“You’ve got me,” Brian points out. “And Legs. And Simone. And Ari and Justin and—”

“True.” The tender attention is really too much, softens his voice to dulcet.

“You like that,” Brian notes, and redoubles his efforts with both hands now.

“Mmmhmmm,” Pat purrs, basking in the feeling. Warmth pools in his neck and, bizarrely, the pleasantness pulls out of him a little whimper that surprises both of them.

“I’ve never dated anybody this long.” The kid’s voice is soft, like he’s trying not to break a spell. “I usually get dumped.”

Pat wants to scoff in disbelief but it comes out more a sigh. “Who’d do that to you. You’re incredible.”

“Patrick, you literally just tried to break up with me.” Chiding, but gentle.

“Didn’t manage it,” Pat yawns. “I’m fucking trash at breakups. Guess I just have to keep you.”

Brian says something, but it’s faded by exhaustion and the touches and Patrick just lets it go.

* * *

It’s early evening, when Patrick gets a call from Legs. As soon as the phone lights up, he knows it’s trouble. Legs doesn’t _call_ him. And sure as fuck not at six-thirty on a Monday.

“Sup.”

“Get over here. And bring a change of clothes. It’s Brian.”

He hangs up without fanfare, shoves a fistful of whatever’s clean into his backpack, and gets over to Lemelson before he can even speculate about what the fuck that means.

The kid’s not in his room—doesn’t open the door, at least—so he heads to Allegra’s instead, taps out a sharp little knock that is acknowledged so quickly that Pat almost raps her on her scowling face.

“He’s in here,” she nods her chin upwards a tick, and lets him in. Brian’s on her couch, wrapped in a purple towel—it must be hers—and smiles sheepishly.

“Sorry to bug you,” he says, biting his lip. “Legs thought you could help me get back in my room?”

Patrick seethes. This is some first year pranking bullshit. Which isn’t to say it’s not effective. Wait ‘til someone’s in the shower—steal their clothes and their towel from the little bench—powerpunch their door and change the combo. It’d be fuckin’ easy with Brian, he’s always singing up a storm in the shower and paying attention to nothing in the world, and the little idiot’s only got a two-digit door combination, you can get it in fifteen goddamn seconds.

Brian gets dressed in Pat’s t-shirt and plaid boxers—if he’s been crying, Legs must have waited ‘til it was over to call—now he’s just whining _Pat why are these so scratchy, ughhh_. Meanwhile, Patrick lets Allegra talk him down from banging on every door in the building looking for witnesses to menace.

“That’d make it even more embarrassing for him, Pat,” she frowns.

“I’m not embarrassed!” Brian sulks adorably and brushes back his wet hair. “I’m _fine_. Just can’t get in my room.”

Pat sighs. “I’ll powerpunch it for you. And then we’re setting it with a half-press. To at least give those fucks a challenge.”

“Thank you,” Brian gets up. “Let’s hurry, so we can do it before Jenna gets back—I don’t want her to be bothered by this bullshit.”

“Yeah. Tell her—just, fuck. I’m sorry, kid. Didn’t mean to—I feel guilty—” he doesn’t like apologizing in front of Allegra, but he probably deserves it. “Sorry you had to do a fucking shower curtain walk of shame. That’s some real middle school bullshit.”

Legs snorts. “I told you you should have used the shower curtain, you little freak.”

The kid fucking _grins._ “Why? That thing’s prolly filthy.”

Pat blinks. “What? What’d you—”

Allegra groans. “He knocked on my door _naked as the day he was born,_ Gill, I thought I was gettin’ a fucking x-rated singing telegram.”  

Patrick is furious, fucking _furious,_ but he still can’t stop laughing.

* * *

Pat forces the combo into Brian’s room. It doesn’t take long, with these old bullshit locks. Five little metal buttons, you can slam out every combination in under thirty minutes, if you’ve got quick hands. Those fuckers probably set all the digits, so he does the fives and gets it pretty quick, under a hundred tries. Then he sets a new combo for the kid, makes sure he knows how to half-hold one number down while he presses the next, a little analog trick that makes it harder for errant fuckers like Pat to get in by brute force and cause you grief.

“Thanks,” Brian smiles, as Pat makes him practice once or twice. “These things are really bullshit, huh? They should put something more secure. Don’t the students complain?”

“It mighta came up on the last dorm renovation proposal. We—it tends to get voted down.” He leans against the sink.

“Why? Wouldn’t everyone be safer?”

Pat coughs. “Rumor is if your door’s too hard to powerpunch, those Ridley kids don’t give up. Rumor is they just take it off the hinges. And that’s way more annoying.”

Brian snorts. “You guys _suck_ , oh my god. I’m lucky I’m not getting picked on by _you_.”

“I would never,” Pat pulls him close, and kisses the top of his head. “You’re just a frosh. A baby. And besides, I’ve never done a thing like that in my life.”

“Then who took Pete Driscoll’s door last term?” Brian arches back and looks at him, eyebrow raised. “‘Cause he was pretty convinced it was you.”

“I absolutely had nothing to do with that,” Pat says serenely. “And you know I’m telling the truth, because I wouldn’t’ve fucking left a note. He would have had to check _every_ roof for it.”

A bark of a laugh, shocked. “How the heck haven’t you been expelled for this shit, Patrick.”

Pat half-shrugs against Brian’s back. “Admin’re worthless. Even Driscoll knows that. Drag them in and they’re just as likely to fuck you in the ass as help. A spilled milkshake? A shitty prank? They could give a fuck. All they care about is cheating and drinking and drugs and talking to reporters. You read my paper about shadow vigilantism, yeah?”

“Yeah, and I _really_ think you should’ve put the semicolon after _spurred on by draconian and ineffective community policing._ ”

“Fuck the law and fuck your comma splice rules,” Pat tickles him, and elicits a sparkly little laugh.

The laughter ends quickly, when the kid opens his closet.

There’s nothing fucking _there_.

“Oh, _dear_ ,” Brian sighs, pauses a moment—

and then moves quick to _tackle_ Pat, who’s on his way out the door—

he doesn’t know who he’s on the way to murder, he just knows that he’s so pissed his vision’s black and grey, and he needs to take it out on fuckin’ _someone._ Brian, though, is so physically insistent that it’s impossible to disentangle himself, to get free and get out and go figure out whose ass to beat about this. Eventually he’s wrestled to the couch and straddled and the kid’s soothing him, petting down his face, with little placating statements of calm and reason and trust-in-lawfulness and other shit like that.

“C’mon, Pat. Like I said. I’ll go bug the RA about it, okay? They’ll know what to do.”

Pat snorts and tightens his grip on Brian’s waist. He wants to punch something _so badly_ , but he also wants to draw that little body close and wrap it with his arms and not let go.

“It’s fine, Patrick. Nothing I own’s worth anything, anyway. Like, it’s all thrifted.”

“That’s fucking _bullshit_ , Brian, those _fucks_ —”

“They’ll bring it back, Pat. Prolly. It happened to Tully first term, I think? Someone froze all her underwear in a block of ice for fucking the wrong person.” A pause. “It’s not very _nice_ , but yknow. When everyone’s an outlaw.”

The kid presses his forehead into Pat’s, staring most unsettlingly into his eyes. It’s fuckin’ painful, that little open-clever look, a tiny bit wry, as if daring Patrick to open up that argument again, the one they’d had for _days_ about the conclusion to that paper.

_Yeah, you might get more utilitarian benefit in the short-term from working outside the system, Pat, but it leads to progressive lawlessness which is overall more dangerous—_

_I call foul. That’s a slippery-slope argument. Bullshit._

_Not bullshit! Extrajudicial punishment empowers rogue community actors, Patrick, and that’s just gonna further enforce community norms—there’s a legit slippery-slope mechanism—_

_Okay, fuckin’ ceded, but fuck your dichotomy, because it’s not a choice between with-the-law and against, Brian, there’s no legitimate avenue for democratic participation—_

_There is! Even if it’s not built in, like, collective peaceful action—_

_Is bullshit, Bri. There’s no reason to listen to the underclass unless they’re a credible threat to overthrow your shit. Not useful if the system is asymmetrical by design._

_You and your friggin’ Foucault, Pat. Sometimes people actually try to do the right thing._

_Yeah, and what’s right for the governing is directly at cross-purposes to what’s right for the governed, so once you’ve split the two, Brian, there’s no goddamn turning back._

_Then fine, just end your stupid paper saying that justice is impossible and we’re all doomed._

“Pat? Are you okay?”

Pat hunches a bit, chastened. “Yeah, I just—nothing. Nothing.”

“Please don’t do anything about this,” Brian bites his lip. “I don’t wanna rile them up worse, okay? So just chill? For me?”

Patrick sighs, and hugs him. “All right, kid. We’ll do it your way. I’ve fucked it all to kingdom come so far, that’s true enough.”

“Thank you,” Brian sighs in relief. “It’s not a big deal, anyway.”

“It is,” Pat insists.

“ ‘Snot. It’s fine. Like I said, it’s all worthless shit.”

“Take that back. I _definitely_ lent you one of my jackets.”

Brian laughs, and teases, and is fuckin’ indefatigable, and shoos Pat off to class so he can finish his homework. Pat stops by Legs’ room for a minute, ‘cause yeah, maybe he’s promised not to plot malicious revenge, but it’s not his business if _someone_ does, all right.

* * *

Brian shows up for caf the next night in Jenna's clothes. 

But not just any of her clothes, all right? The kid’s—he’s _crazy_ —

but he has got style, Pat has to give him that.

“Hey Patrick,” he says innocently, as he slides in the door.

The little maniac has on a daisy print halter top that exposes...well, more than a few inches of smooth belly, and dip-dyed jean shorts that permit Pat to ogle an _obscene_ amount of slim hairy leg.

Pat gapes for a second, stupidly. “What’re you...I...I could’ve brought you more clothes, Bri.”

The kid hitches up an arm to rub the back of his neck, dips his chin a little shyly. The effect is _electrifying_ , hideously adorable, sweet and springtime-innocent and like a fucking pinup model. Pat is _dying_ —

Brian dimples. He knows what the fuck he’s doing, little asshole. “Yeah,” he smiles. “Just decided to lean into it, though. I tattled to the RA and they were just like _oh let’s wait a few days to see if they give them back_.”

“Typical assholes,” Pat gets out, although really most of what he’s doing is staring.  

“So I was like—smoking and griping with Jenna on the roof—she was like _oh don’t worry I got clothes you can borrow_ —and then she was like _oh shit how funny would it be if you really went ham_ —and so, well—”     

“Smart bitch,” Pat says, and he’d _like_ to say more, about what good fucking Sun Tzu psychological warfare that shit is, but instead his thoughts are cut off at the pass when Brian slips by him innocently to start setting up, and he turns, and—

oh _fuck,_ it’s one of _those_ shirts, one of those saucy little summer numbers with just one little bow at the neck and one at the waist and all sweet smooth bare back, and if Patrick just grabbed those ribbons and pulled then Brian’d unravel like a birthday present—

“ _Jesus_ fucking Christ,” he swears.

“So you like the new look, daddy?” Brian flirts, and flips his hair, and holy mary in heaven above this kid’s unstoppable, unstoppable.

“ _Fuck_ yes,” he reaches out a hand—he’d like his palms in those cute little back pockets yes please—

“No touchy ‘til after work,” Brian teases, dances out of reach delicately.

“Oh, _fuck_ that, we can open late,” Pat growls. “I can’t spend the next six hours with a boner.”

“Too baaaaad,” the little shit grins. “You can go jerk off alone if you have to, I guess. But if you can wait I’ll make it good.”

Pat could fuckin’ cry at the thought, the bitter tears of the condemned, and resigns himself to an entire shift of finding excuses to hold things in front of himself. “You always make it good,” he sighs. “Whether I deserve it or not.”

Brian’s whole face lights up with wicked delight, whenever he knows that Pat’s gonna play along. He reaches out and swats Pat’s ass. “Go set up the grill, Patrick.”

Patrick obeys, reluctantly, though as he’s on his way out to do it he gives a long, lusty, baleful stare that’s half a joke but really mostly not. Brian tinkles a laugh and waves airily. “If you like this, you’re _really_ gonna dig the panties.”

Pat chokes, and flees.

* * *

Patrick’s good _all_ shift—

okay actually that is objectively not true, there are no less than three distinct moments in which he sneaks up on the kid—wraps an arm around his chest to pull him close and another around his slim bare waist to thrust below those jeans and feel the kid’s cock against silky fabric—Brian tries to _tsk_ at him but usually only after a couple of quite delightful _moans_ and a little buck of his perfect pointy hips.

“I’m going to fucking wreck you, baby boy,” he mutters darkly into Brian’s ear.

Brian turns his head and _licks_ Pat’s face, and he can feel the smirking, against his chin.

“Patience, daddy,” he says, but it’s cut off with an inelegant squeak when Patrick squeezes. “Ooh, you rogue.” He pulls away, buttons himself up, brushes off invisible dirt. “How _dare_ you, I am at _work_.”

“Sorry,” Pat groans, a little embarrassed—

but Brian hops up on the counter, next to the register. Presses his palms flat behind him and leans back and spreads his knees. It’s—

 _fuck_ , he’s hard, it’s clear, and Pat’s literally never wanted to touch something so much in his life.

“Brian. Let me suck you off,” he begs. “I’m fucking _dying_ over here.”

“Hmmm. I dunno...I guess technically that _counts_ as being good, but…”

“ _Please_ ,” Pat says again, rests a hand on Brian’s bare knee, strokes it, coaxing. “Please, kid. You can’t do this to me. Have mercy.”

Brian twists his waist elegantly, looks over his shoulder. Caf’s empty—it’s pretty late, but not _that_ late—and when he turns back, he has a quite devilish look on his face.

“Well. I guess if you’re quick.”

Pat drops to his knees like he’s at mass—pulls the kid out, pushing down the ridiculous panties reverently and pumps twice, kissing up the velvety skin.

Brian giggles and squirms. “Tickles! You’ve got stubble, Patri— _oh_ —”

It’s gratifying, to shut the kid up for a second, to just swirl and suck hard at the tip. He wraps one hand firmly around the base of his cock, cups the other around his ass, sneaking his fingers between the bare skin and the jeans, gripping hard and pulling him closer.

“Oh gosh,” Brian gasps, and rests his hands lightly on Pat’s head. “That’s—that’s _very_ —”

He doesn’t fuck around, this time, ‘cause he’s supposed to be quick—he sucks and flicks and licks the tip, sure—but he mostly pumps and grips that tight little ass so hard it’ll probably have a handprint tomorrow. Brian throws his head back theatrically, and if he’s doing it to check the door for privacy Pat doesn’t fucking care, because it’s goddamn _hot_ , the way he arches so far he’s almost a U-shape.

“Pat, I’m gonna—” he pants, and Pat hums assent and squeezes and pumps and the kid comes with a bright little stifled shout.

It’s good, feeling him pulse and still, his fingers carding steadily, hand over hand, through Patrick’s hair. Pat lets out a long breath through his nose, and just stays there, genuflecting, a long moment, with the kid’s weight in his mouth, appreciating—

Brian pulls his hair, gently, pulls him off. Patrick kisses him, twice, on his length, and looks up. The kid’s oddly tender, not nearly the fierce little horny look he was giving up earlier. He strokes a hand on Patrick’s cheek, finds a spot of saliva, rubs along his lip. Pat nudges forward, takes the finger into his mouth, sucks it hungrily.

“Thank you, Patrick,” Brian murmurs downward, to the man he has on his knees.

“Anytime.”

“We should probably—” he throws a glance back “—I could try to—”

“I’ll wait,” Pat sighs, as he tuck himself back in. “It’s only a coupla hours left.”

“That’s not very fair,” Brian says softly, pulling Pat up.

“Life isn’t fair, kid.” He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand. “And I’ve been promised if I’m good it’ll be a real showstopper.”

“You’re _awesome,_ ” Brian grins, tosses his wild hair, and curls his legs around Pat’s hips to drag him close. “I’m gonna screw your friggin’ brains out.”

* * *

There’s a little snag, when they ramble home to Pat’s. Not a distraction, exactly, though there’s plenty of those, too—Pat has a couple good walls he likes to muscle the kid up against and kiss the breath out of him, pin his wrists above his head and grind into him until he whines so loud a passing security guard sticks his head in the alley to check—

“Cool it, guys, go home with that,” he shoos them with his flashlight—

Patrick says _yes, sir_ contritely, but Brian just laughs—

probably because Pat doesn’t bother letting him go while he says it—

and then as soon as the fellow’s gone Pat goes right back to it, driving his tongue into that giggling mouth and sucking on down his throat.

“I’m gonna get a citation like this,” Brian laughs.

“You’re a troublemaker, I hear,” Pat breathes. “Wouldn’t be the first time.”

“It _would_ ,” Brian says indignantly, but Pat ignores him, puts a firm hand on his hips and rolls him over so he can pin the kid bellyward to the brick and hold his sneaky little wrists down and fuck with that expanse of smooth exposed back instead. “Oh my _god,_ Patrick, you’re incorrigible.”

Yeah, so there’re a couple of delightful distractions along the way that can be mapped out like an astrology chart on Brian’s blotchy skin. But when they get there—

“Fuckin’ assholes,” Pat grumbles, at the trashbag on the stoop. His roommates can be pricks, but not even taking it down to the can is a new low.

“No, wait, I think—” Brian says, and pulls it up, looks inside. It’s half-empty-ish, which is strange, and the kid’s expression does a funny little series of jumps, the first of which is relief, but the next few Pat can’t quite get a handle on. “Yeah. It’s my clothes.”

“Fuckin’ _finally_. Are they good? All there?”

“All there, I think,” Brian sighs, and shoulders the bag. “But you’re not gonna like it. Come inside, I probably better, like, tie you down.”

Patrick’s heart drops to somewhere approximately his knees. “What is it. Show me.”

“No,” Brian punches the combination. Pat grabs at the bag, but the kid dodges, slips in, hurries through the messy living room and darts into Pat’s corner bedroom like a shot. God _damn_ it he’s fuckin’ ridiculous.

“What the fuck Bri—” he shoves open the door and—

the kid _slams_ into him with kissing, hooks a leg around and pulls his knee and topples them both to the bed. Pat’s more—

more _frustrated_ than anything, he’s not fuckin’ hard any more and he just wants to know what new goddamn disaster has happened—

he’s saying as much, but Brian’s ignoring him. He’s lithe, the little fucker, and he’s not the strongest, but he gets Pat on his back and his knees around Pat’s waist and it’s hard to figure out how to slither out from under him without just throwing him to the ground, and for the dozenth fuckin’ time, Patrick is _not going to do that_.

“Let me up,” he growls. “I’m not fucking around, Brian. What’d those fucks do to your clothes.”

“I’ll tell you _later_ ,” Brian resettles his hips a little. He’s pinning Pat’s wrists down. “If you’re good.”

“I’m not gonna be _good_ , kid. I’m an angry asshole and I’m pissed as hell. Let me _see_.”

“Nope nope nope,” Brian shakes his head sharply. “Not right now. This isn’t gonna ruin my night, Pat Gill. I won’t let it. And if you get all bitchy about it I’ll cry right on your face.”

Pat throws his head back in frustration. “You’re playing dirty now.”

“ _You_ taught me how to play,” Brian gives a little smile. “So deal with it, daddy. You’re gonna grab on here—” he presses Pat’s fingers to the headboard—it’s flimsy trash, not worth a dime, but it’s got a slat to grab at least “—and you’re not gonna let go. Because you’re a horny fuck and that’s what you’ve gotta do if you’re gonna get some tonight.” He pauses. “And also because you love me and want me to be happy.”

“Jesus fuck,” Patrick stares at him, goggle-eyed.

“I mean it,” Brian pouts. “Suck it up. I’m driving tonight.”

“I—you—did you just _weaponize_ the L-word, you maniac.”

“Oh,” Brian laughs, a high-pitched chuckle. “I didn’t—I guess so?”

Pat groans and flexes his fingers. “You’re such a little shit.”

“But you love me for it…?” Brian says, and he’s a little...a little vulnerable. Hopeful. Like he’s not sure what Pat’s gonna say, but his heart’s hanging on it, either way. And _fucking hell_.

“Yeah, God help me.” Pat sighs. “You win, Machiavelli. I love you, all right? I’m literally—there’s nothing I can—”

Brian _smothers_ him in kisses, and—

whatever bullshit they’ve got to deal with—

whatever fucking ethical thesis they’ve got to fight out, to cut to ribbons, to bang against each other until someone buckles—

whoever Patrick has to _murder_ —

it can fucking wait until morning, all right?

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> outfit inspo: https://i2.wp.com/fazhion.co/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Non-Binary-Fashion-Inspiration-73.jpg
> 
> here is one of the references from pat's vigilantism paper ( https://scholarship.law.upenn.edu/faculty_scholarship/506/ ) but i make no claims about the validity of his conclusions after all he did fail polysci at least once
> 
> also yes these door locks are real ( https://i.redd.it/rl4rjzlkn5621.jpg ) and yes they are in dorms at high-profile universities and yes you can powerpunch them there are only a couple hundred possibilities which doesn't take that long to brute force and yes, it's not that hard to get the door off, either.


	10. hanuman thawai waen (part one)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **riverblujay** held my hand through every step of wrenching this chapter out of my useless brain, from vague outline to ugly drafts to connecting up motifs to everywhere in between.
> 
> also, yeah, chess-boxing comes in 11 rounds, but this bitch is coming in twelve, because I (a) can't pace for shit and my penultimate chapters are always like 10,000 words for some reason and (b) have had writer's block for a month and the second half of this chapter is murdering me dead. i swear i know everything that happens. it's just WRITING IT OH FUCK ME
> 
> so instead, a shorty chapter and the promise of more to come. explicit mentions of prior events (bullying and non-consensual sex) but nothing more graphic than previous chapters. we're trying to apotheosize over here.

###  ** round 10. hanuman thawai waen.  **

(the monkey presents the ring) evade opponent’s punch to the face.  
counter with elbow strike to the ribs. 

* * *

Simone’s fingernails are gorgeous. Purple-black tipped with gold. Like, _goals_ , man. 

Brian shakes his head briskly to force out distraction. He’s probably been quiet, like, way too long, staring at her hands, not knowing how to answer _so what’s wrong kid, if this isn’t about finding some kush_ and not knowing how to meet her sharp gaze and not knowing why he called her, exactly. 

“I’m—” he sighs. “I need some advice.” 

“You’ve come to the right place,” she gestures grandly. “The doctor is in. Five cents.” 

Bri smiles. “It’s about Pat.” 

“Well of _course_ it’s about Patrick,” Simone snorts. “You wouldn’t fuckin’ call me for help with algebra. What’d he do? Besides try to punch some shame into Frankie.” 

“It’s mostly that,” Brian murmurs, and stirs his spoon in his latte. They’re down at the hipster coffee place, the stupid one where they make you smell the beans, because Brian likes it pretty well and also this is the kind of conversation that shouldn’t happen on-campus. Simone’s drinking honey and hot water, which made the blue-haired barista scowl prettily but also admit that _yes, technically, that’s free._

“Patty’s a lil stupid when he gets worked up,” she reaches out and touches his hand gently. “Don’t take it like that, baby, it’s not your fault if he gets in trouble.”

“It’s not that. It’s, um. I’m worried he’s gonna do it again?” 

She taps her fingernails on the table. “I’ll talk to him. Remind him he needs to let you call the shots.” A pause. “I’ll go ahead and make the same offer I did before, though, ” 

Brian shakes his head and dips his chin and feels fidgety. He’s never _really_ talked to Simone about it, not like that, at least not while they were sober. He has a vague, half-baked memory of lying on the floor of her room, limbs splayed ungainly, giggling between whippets and breathing in the sickly-sweet smell of incense. The conversation veered—god knows why, probably his fault, probably he made a tasteless joke, he’s got a loose-tongued knack for gunning right toward the worst topics when he’s feeling the best feelings—and she jabbed him in the ribs with her sharp elbows until he turned, smiling, to face her. 

She wasn’t smiling, though. Her face had flicked to grim, austere, sharp as a switchblade. _You know, Bri—say the word—I’ll make sure they can never look you in the face again._ The details, after that, are hazy-dark. Probably, she didn’t elaborate. Probably, he didn’t tell her much. Probably, he tried to laugh it off. Probably, she didn’t let him. All he remembers is waking up with a headache, curled in her arms, face pulling oddly with the feel of dry tear-tracks. She took him out for pancakes to get the cottony taste out of his mouth and she smiled and packed that strange cold wrath away for another day. 

Simone and Pat are kind of alike. Angry sparks behind dark eyes. Pat’s is more obvious, ‘cause it bursts out in ragged explosions, lurches, ignites with unexpected speed. Simone’s a more well-organized magazine. Her anger’s a coiled snake, well-trained, waiting in the charmer’s basket. Waiting to be summoned. 

Brian’s counting on that. 

“I need help,” he says, softly, which stills her for a second. “ ‘Cause I guess, um. Word got around that I’m. Trying to—um. Make allegations.” He pauses, sighs. 

“If Frank’s worried about his _image,_ ” Simone hisses, “he needs to keep his fucking dick in his pants. It’s not your problem to manage him eating shit for what he’s done.” 

“Honestly I think he’s not the problem,” Brian admits. “I think it’s Todd.” 

Todd. Seeing him is fine, it’s _fine_ , unless he’s with Pat. Then Brian, he—

he doesn’t like the way it makes his chest feel. Like something foul has been fermenting, eating its way through the detritus between his ribs, growing hotter and hotter with self-consuming heat. It _burns._

Brian blinks, refocuses on her military _rat-a-tat_ on the table. 

“ _He_ has no shame. I bet that fuck’d be proud for everyone to know the bullshit he can get away with.” 

“Well.” Brian worries his lip, a little nervously. “Maybe. But I think it’s more—Pat got into it with them, Simone. And now I’ve got, like, problems.”    

Her beautiful nails _dig_ into his arm. “What kind of problems, Brian.” 

He shrugs. “Nothing that bad. Kinda like, um, they just stirred up the shit from September again. But I wasn’t dating Patrick in September. So he’s not used to it.” 

Simone sighs and relents with her grip, strokes his wrist apologetically. “I’m sorry, baby. It kills me, that you’re getting picked on. Makes me wanna burn the whole world down. I’m not quite as pissy about it as Patrick, but you _know_ I feel the same.” 

“Appreciated,” he nods. “But like, I think—it’s not even about me, Sim. I think Todd’s just…just goading Pat. To get him to go ape. I think he’ll shake and shake until—” 

“That dumbass gets expelled, yeah,” Simone says, deadpan-dry and without humor. “Sounds like him.” 

“Uh-huh,” Brian sighs, and stirs, and balances his thoughts. “I don’t—I just want it to _stop_ , yknow? I don’t care how. So I’ve been kinda. Thinking it over.”

* * *

Brian _has_ been thinking. Intensely, actually. Unbidden, the thinking creeps up, amid studying flashcards or memorizing monologues, between the notes of new songs and under the slug of boozy-tiredness on idle evenings. Ever since his fingers traced the blue-red ridges on Pat’s pale back. 

 _I need to fix this,_ he told himself, _before he does._

Patrick is gorgeous and brilliant and furiously tender-hearted. It’s so strange, how deeply he still aches about Brian’s summer indiscretions. Even mentioning it makes him go so pale he’s almost green, turns his expression both rough and fragile, like he might be about to cry but he’d throw himself in front of a train before he’d let you see it. Brian loves it, and it scares him. 

Last weekend, Brian called himself an _attention whore_ when they were smoking hookah in hazy-sweet celebration—cross-legged on the thin iron-railed balcony— he was talking through his happiness— his first-ever successful college presentation— people laughed at his jokes— his professor liked it— the Alzheimer's research one who he hopes has space in his lab— and then he threw off a comment, with a laugh, and— 

Pat’s face closed off like slamming storm shutters. _Don’t say that shit_. 

_It’s just an expression, Pat._

They bickered for a while, debated, played off each other—  

> _**Pat’s opening** : That shit seeps into your brain, whether you believe it or not.  
>  **Brian’s counter** : I like to own it, Pat. That’s how you win. It’s just words. _

—the vagaries of moral desert— 

> _**Pat’s attack** : Those fucks deserve to be torn apart by rabid dogs.  
>  **Brian’s sacrifice** : No. But yeah, I’ll give you that, like, if you know any dogs that can really blow their shit up on social media, they do deserve that. _

—the nuances of consent— 

> _**Pat’s gambit:** If I took a dip of Justin’s fucking jungle juice and passed out in the courtyard, Brian, are you saying that’s a free-for-all? ‘cause that’s just a fuckin Tuesday for me. Let me know if I gotta start buying sexier underwear. _  
>  _**Brian’s countergambit:** That’s a false equivalency, Pat. None of us were sober. We all were boning down. The last thing I fucking remember is hanging off Todd’s dick, okay? And being into it. So like. It doesn’t—you’re not—context— _  
>  _**Pat’s followup:** Context. Cool. So Tuesday I’ll make out with someone before I pass out, I guess. Be nice if you came ‘round after to clean me up. _  
>  _**Brian’s surrender:** Pat—please—please don’t—let’s not. Talk about this. Anymore. _

—they go around and around, in these conversations, and haven’t yet found what substance makes them see eye to eye, dulls their sharp-tongued arguments. Or what’ll make Pat just fucking _let it go_.

And worse, something about Patrick’s vehemence, his rancor— 

it’s been leaking, bleeding into Brian’s own thoughts. He’s friggin’ terrified of Patrick getting in a fight, getting himself pummeled by a larger angrier _nastier_ body—

Brian knows what _that’s_ like, he points out acridly, when they’re drunkest and the arguments are most vicious and he’s just rooting around in Patrick’s mind for a way to shut him the fuck up, even if it makes Pat look like he’s gonna puke— 

he’s terrified of a fight, but sometimes. 

Sometimes he finds himself remembering. What it looked like. Pat slugging Franklin in the jaw, quick and accurate, so hard that he went reeling. 

It doesn’t appall him, the memory. It feels _good_. 

Which is…unsettling. Brian’s put this one well to bed, and even if he hadn’t, you can’t _beat_ good manners into people. ( _Let me introduce you to my dad,_ Pat snarks, and Brian doesn’t know whether to laugh or cry or look cautiously hopeful that that might be in the cards… one day…?) 

No, you can’t fight your way to happiness. You just have to live, and risk, and try, and fail, and make mistakes and learn from them. It’s not healthy, to hold grudges, to hate people, to want your scowling-fiery boyfriend to hold Todd down by the neck and drive his knuckles into that soft smirking handsome cheekbone— 

Yup. Not healthy. 

Because if Pat knew Brian was ever entertaining these bloodthirsty thoughts, he’d fall all over himself making them real, and that’d be an earnest _disaster_ , that’d end bad for everyone. 

Even if the fact that Pat’s _methods_ are madness doesn’t technically mean his point is wrong _._

Even if you’re fucking sick of arguing that it was all consensual, because it leaves a sickly-rotting taste.

Even if the sanguine punch-drunk nightmares are better than the ones they have replaced. 

Even if Todd’s a fucking asshole, and _he’s_ the one who’s not just letting this lie. 

 _Even if you’re right, Patrick, you can’t just punch somebody in the friggin’ throat_ , Brian says, and he means it, and he’s gotta find some way to fix this shit before Pat realizes that he might be winning this one by sheer attrition. 

Brian’s losing. So he needs to try a pretty wild gambit.  

* * *

His coffee’s cold long before Brian gets around to explaining his plans. His ideas need a lot of preamble, enough runway to explain—

“—the clothes aren’t really a big deal? I’ve been, like, bullied before, but—”

“It’s a big deal,” Simone contradicts, counters, not angry like Pat would do, just flat and straight-on with dead-eye accuracy. “This is beyond bullying. It’s harassment. It’s basically witness-tampering, is what it is.” 

He can’t help himself from flashing a weak half-smile at that. “There’s no trial, Sim—” 

“There _could_ be,” she drawls, flicks her wrist so her bracelets and her fingertips shimmer. “But I get you, baby. I really do. They raped you, but you didn’t think they should hang for it.” 

Brian bites his lip, curls at the word, prepares for her to jab her finger through the air and make it clear to him _just how wrong he is_ , about that. But she doesn’t. 

“Or maybe you just didn’t trust the hangman to do his job. Which, fuckin’ smart, you’re not goddamn wrong. They were drunk, you were drunk, we’re all stupid horny kids, the cops are fucks. So you let them off the hook. Fuckin’ big of you.” 

This analysis—waved casually over the last of her weird hot-lemon-water before she goes to refill it— _slams_ into Brian’s sternum like he’s being tackled by a particularly angry ghost. 

Literally no one has ever said that he—that he might have done something _right_ —  

“Do you really think that,” he says, breathlessly, when she comes back, and he’s probably too hung up on it because she stares at him funny. 

Her head tilts like she’s about to ask for clarification, so Brian just gives it.

“D’you really think that I didn’t fuck up?” 

She snorts. “Fuck up _what_? Tryna get laid?” 

Not exactly. Plenty of people would tell him he’s wrong, for who he wants to fuck and how enthusiastically, but Brian doesn’t—he doesn’t care about that. He chases his bliss. He’s loud and proud. He was raised that way, even if _yes_ , a few shouting matches rocked the Gilbert household in high school, about the particular brand of living he likes to court. _You’re reckless_ , his mom would shake her head when he clambered into his second-story window at 3am to find her sitting on his bed.

It’s the same sentiment, but a distinctly different flavor, when Patrick calls him _a filthy-minded little libertine_. Brian prefers Pat’s sobriquet. Debauchery has such a more delicious flair in eighteenth-century French. 

No, Brian doesn’t waste a second with the folks who think he’s a slut. A horny idiot. That he got what he deserved. But... 

“Do you really think, um. I’m not fucking it up. Now. By, um, not wanting to pursue it?” 

That’s probably enough, for her to get it, but Brian keeps talking, pushes it out.

“Pat gets mad at me. That I want to let it go.” 

Her breath stops, bites off, chews on that idea for a second. She comes at the next sentence a little more gentle than she might usually. “I think they deserve whatever Pat wants to do to them, probably, but I also think you’re not wrong, Bri. It’s rational.” 

“Rational,” Brian repeats, disbelieving, and sips his coffee before he remembers it’s ice-cold. Simone catches his grimace but her responding expression is unreadable. 

“Pat’s not being pragmatic.” Her syllables are even, relaxed. She gets like this, when she’s trying to argue with somebody—argue for _real_ that is, not just bark hyena-like and turn away. She’s a very mellow debate partner, actually, when she really cares what you think. “Who’s it gonna hurt, spending all that time hating them? You’re smart, to not waste your energy. To move on. Live your life.” 

Brian just nods. He finds he’s hanging on her words. 

“Sounds like maybe those fucks aren’t letting you handle this how you want, though…?” Her nail scratches along the table, makes no sound, but like she’s maybe caught a thread from her sweater and is pulling it out, gently.

He sighs. “No. They’re—no. I wish they’d just—ugh. I never—” He grasps at the air, as if the second half of all his frustrated sentences can be plucked out, somewhere. “They’re so fucking _stupid,_ Simone. if they’d leave me the fuck alone I’d never give them a second of trouble.” 

“Mmmhmm,” is all she says, maddeningly. 

“Fuck, I’ve been really _chill_ , I think,” he shakes his head. “All Pat and you and Allegra and everyone think I should do is go prank-crazy or punch somebody or call the _cops_ or some other big thing—” 

“—I don’t think you _should_ do anything, Brian—” Simone tries to cut in, but Brian doesn’t let her

“Fine, _you_ don’t, but _Pat_ does. But I don’t want to. Even if it’s wrong, or whatever. I just wanted to get on with my fucking life. Everyone thinks this is like the worst thing that’s ever happened to me and it did fucking _suck_ but like—honestly I think failing Chem 1 would have been worse and like—Patrick did that _twice_ so—” 

Simone’s face goes from concerned at his flurry of words to a straight-up laugh of surprise. “Hah, point. I getcha.” 

Brian huffs a sigh. “Like yeah, of course I hate their guts and I don’t wanna be around them. And yeah secretly maybe I—”  he wavers on the cusp of how to say it, “—I dunno. I don’t want revenge or anything. That’s fucking dumb. But they won’t leave me the hell _alone_ and I have to do something about it, now, and it’s their own fucking fault.” 

“Ooh,” her eyebrow raises. “Are you finally coming around, my budding young pacifist friend…?”

“No,” Brian shakes his head sternly. “I don’t want anyone to get hurt.” 

“I’m not gonna punch anyone, Brian.” Her voice narrows. “But I could make those fucks regret it.” 

“ _No_ ,” he counters again, taps his own fingernails on the table for emphasis. “That’s not what I’m talking about.”

She sighs. “You’re a good kid. You like to do the right thing.” Her mouth twists wry, and she gives a little half-serious, half-jokey whine. “ _C’mon,_ Bribri, let me be the bad guy. Let me show them that _biblical_ vengeance. They’ll be better for it.” 

Brian smiles a little. She and Pat are _so_ alike, sometimes. “I’m pretty sure that’s not a standard reading of _vengeance is mine,_ Simone.” 

She waves a hand. “Don’t be a literalist, kid. The LORD’s a little vague. One page he’s all _oh that’s my job,_ next page he’s all _render unto Caesar,_ then we’re all out there tryin’ to gouge out eyes and so on. Ethics is complicated.” 

“It is, but listen,” Brian says, breathlessly. “This bit isn’t complicated. I’m not, like, a nasty prank expert, but I get how it works, okay? D’you know how those Ridley seniors get kicked off-campus, last year?” 

Simone cocks her head. “Well, I certainly fucking know, because I was _there_ , but that feels rhetorical.” 

“It is,” Brian shoots her a grin, for her patience. “Here’s the game. They do some shit to our side. We do some shit to theirs. Back and forth. Little things. Keep it under the radar. Retaliate. Never anything big enough, overt enough, that admin will care. And then _someone_ finally does something big enough that the deans hear about it, and then those folks all get expelled, or whatever, the end. Sound about right?”

She wiggles her fingers. “You’re missing some of the subtleties. But I get your point. The escalation. Fair.” 

“I don’t wanna play it like that,” Brian asserts. “It’s dumb, and it presumes a—a—like a _balance_ or—” 

“—a moral equivalency?” she says dryly. 

“Yeah, that,” he shrugs. 

“ ‘kay, kid. So if we play it your way. You’ve said you can’t let it go, anymore, and you’ve told me what you _don’t_ want to do. So what’s the game plan?” 

“I had this idea,” Brian bites a nail. “Jenna kinda inspired me. And it’s—it’s not really _honest_ , but I think it’s fair. And I think it’ll work. And I think Pat’s gonna go fucking ballistic. So I need your help to get him on board? Without punching anyone.”      

Simone steeples her fingertips and grins. “Well, I always like a challenge. Lay it on me, kiddo.” 

Brian does.

* * *

“That’s fucking _crazy,_ Simone,” Pat yells. “That’s not revenge—that’s fucking punishing _himself—_ ”  

“Patrick Gill, no _fucking shouting_ in the War Room,” she barks. “You’re gonna blow the whole game if you yell like that in here. Sit on the god damn floor and make room for people who’re smarter than you before you get uninvited to the god damn rebellion.” 

Pat does not _settle down_ but he permits Brian to pull him into the corner and shove him on the ground and sit on him and beg him to listen, even if the whole time he has to grumble sarcastic shit and frown about it. 

The principles assemble slowly, unobtrusively, in Brian’s room. Jenna and Ash are crowded on the floor. Legs leans against the wall. Roy shows up last—Brian can feel Pat’s surprise—and then Simone shuts the door decisively and calls them all to order. 

“All right, crew. First thing’s first. I’m gonna need to know you’re on board for this shit. That you’re ride or die. That you think this—” she tosses Brian’s shirts on the floor “—is bullshit, the latest bullshit in a string of bullshit so fucking unendurable that you’re willing to fuckin’ get your hands dirty about it.” 

Oh my God Simone is so _dramatic._ Brian feels like he should be taking notes. He had this little spark of an idea—well, Jenna did really, kind of, he just twisted it a bit—but Simone friggin’ muscled that idea onto her spinning wheel and turned it into a goddamn _plot._

There’s some light murmuring while the assembled examine Brian’s ruined shirts. Most of his clothes were fine, honestly. These aren’t even, like, expensive. Just a coupla t-shirts he didn’t like much anyway, marred with a careless red spatters that have a kind of gory _Carrie_ feel, ugly nail-polish handwriting that proclaims, respectively, SLUT and LIAR. 

He’d almost laughed, actually, when he untied the trash bag and realized they’d only messed with couple shirts, the ones on top. Like what the fuck does he care? College is _awash_ with free t-shirts, and it’s not like he didn’t know what half the folks on campus though of him, anyway. It’s not even _public_ humiliation. He could just dump them in the trashcan and get on with his life and no one’d ever even have to know. Some friggin' prank. 

Laying in bed with Pat, later, he bitched about it. _Those fucks are so annoying,_ he pouted. _This is, like, the boringest prank ever. Those aren’t even the nastiest things I’ve been called this week._

 _You’re raising my blood pressure, kid,_ Pat sighed. _It’s not the worst thing they could’ve done, but don’t try to convince me this is all in good fun._

 _Well duh, of course it’s not fun,_ Brian, frustrated, gestured at the ceiling. _It’s really nasty. It’s stupid. They just want to make me ashamed and they’re not even doing it very well._

_It’s cruel. And it’s probably not over._

_Yeah, but like. Why would they punch you_ _and not me. Why’re they doing this baby shit._

Pat shrugs. _They’re stupid, but not that stupid, I guess. I show up at the Dean’s office with a black eye and they’ll just be like, oh well, there goes Gill again, sticking his nose where he shouldn’t. Not so much if you pop over there with a face like little orphan Annie and a fresh split lip._

 _They’re cowards._ Brian seethed. _They’re not afraid to jump you but they won’t even insult me to my face. ‘Cause they know they’ll get in trouble._

_Todd’s like that, kid. Calculating. I’m sorry. I told you they’d figure out how to make your life hell._

_This isn’t_ _hell_ _._ Brian remembers getting annoyed, pushing himself up, throwing the sheets off and springing up to pace a little. He’d only recently gotten comfortable _springing_ anywhere, and he was making the most of it. _It just sucks, and it’s mean, and it’s annoying, and I wanna teach them a lesson._

 _Now we’re talking,_ Pat turned on his side. _Give me the time and place, baby boy._

_Not like that. Or, I dunno. Maybe like that. Something. I dunno what yet. Just let me figure it out._

_All right, kid._

When Pat jostles his back a little, Brian snaps back to the moment. Simone’s traced out the finer points of their plan already and is taking questions, although pointedly not Patrick’s. The sigh behind him is exasperated.

“So, why d’you need us?” Ash asks, flat. “Sounds like Brian’s all on his own for phase one.” 

Simone taps her finger. “That’s the tricky bit. And you—” she turns on Roy, points at him. “Well. Everyone else in here can stay. I know you fools are good for it. But if you can’t handle telling a little white lie, Chang, you better dip. You’ve got enough to know what’s going down.” 

Roy is always terribly hard to for Brian to read. He’s small, close-cropped dark hair. He doesn’t fidget much. He looks you right in the eye, and his expression is always somewhere between thoughtful and wry. He’s smart, though, and if the stories are true he used to be a little wild. 

“Let’s say that I left right about now, then, Sim. I think I can handle saying that, if it comes down to it.” He spaces out his words deliberately. 

“Not good enough, Chang. You stay, I need to know you’re gonna stick your neck out for us.” 

Roy sighs, and wavers. “Simone, I get it. I do. But you’re asking a lot, getting me hooked into you and Pat’s schemes.” 

“Not my scheme, Chang,” Pat growls, from behind Brian’s head. “I’m here as a conscientious objector. It was the fuckin’ kid’s idea. My scheme involved brass knuckles. ”  

Roy looks at him. “Your idea, huh?” 

Brian bites his lip, and nods. 

“Well,” He sighs. “Since you’re one of mine, let’s hear it, then. That’s what I get for letting my frosh hang around Ridley.” 

“Good man,” Legs pats his arm. 

“All right then.” Simone draws herself up smartly and taps the whiteboard. “Then here we go. Point one. The truth. Everyone on campus knows Gilbert’s clothes got stolen on Tuesday, yeah? That’s got out. We all know that.” 

Allegra drawls. “Daresay I’ll never forget it.” 

Sim grins. “Yeah, I know. If they didn’t hear the bit about the Coppertone kid wandering the halls of Lemelson, Legs, they definitely heard about what he was strutting his stuff in on Wednesday at caf. _And_ he talked to your RA, Roy, so that’s all nice and documentable. Above-board. Plenty of witnesses.” 

Roy gestures her to continue. 

“And then his clothes showed back up, of course. And he told you all about it, yeah? ‘Cause you’re his friends. His boyfriend. His house president. He’d tell y’all what they did. Prolly already has. He wouldn’t’ve bothered to tell anyone else. Too embarrassing. Not their business. Right?” 

More nods. 

“So, there’s only a half-dozen people who _really_ know that those pussy bitches only fucked up a couple shirts, hmm? And you’re all in this room. And you’re gonna put your hands in and swear on your fucking mother’s tits that when he told you about it, he said those rat bastards fucked up _all_ his clothes. You got it?” 

There’s some murmuring. 

“Got it? And that’s all I need from you weirdos. Just a promise. Ridley’ll do the rest.” 

Brian coughs. “Um, Simone, we also need—” 

“Right right right,” she clucks, and digs in her purse, and dumps a pile of nail polish tubes on the ground. “Forgot, kiddo. We’re all getting our hands dirty, on this one. You put the spelling words on the whiteboard, teach, and we’ll get bedazzling. Try to make it look like you _mean_ it, cunts.” 

“This is fucking nuts,” Pat sighs, despairing. 

“Oh, don’t bend your dick out of shape, Patty,” Simone scoffs. “It’s fucking brilliant. You just wait.”

 


	11. hanuman thawai waen (part two)

###  ** round 10. hanuman thawai waen.  **

(the monkey presents the ring) evade opponent’s punch to the face.  
counter with elbow strike to the ribs.

* * *

“I’m sorry, sir,” Brian dips his chin and speaks softly. He’s getting good at this conversation, though he still wishes he could blush as red and raw and sweet as Patrick does. Some things you just can’t teach yourself. “Um, I can, put on my sweater, but—” 

“Do that, then,” his professor glowers. “That is completely inappropriate for a classroom setting, Mr. Gilbert. I should think you’d know better.” 

Ooh-hoo-hoo, this bit is always fun. “The, um, sweater’s worse, sir,” Brian holds it up. 

“My _heavens_ , Brian!” 

He mentally categorizes his thin-haired chemistry professor in the _horrifically scandalized by the word “fuckboy”_ column. Most of the faculty are over there—

(although his Shakespeare lecturer laughed her fucking ass off and then apologized profusely—

“ _Oh, Brian, I am so sorry—it’s not appropriate at all and that is terrible—but my God that kerning—”_

he smiled at that, because although Patrick hadn’t been on board with the whole plan, had been _horrified_ by the idea of Brian strutting around campus like a crass advertisement for homophobia, he had agreed to help. And so of course his shirt was the best. Because the phrase CUM-SUCKING BITCH wraps around Brian’s chest _just so_ that while the ugly lettering on the front is lewd and mean and perfect, the back proclaims _KING BITCH_ and he feels pretty fuckin’ fly about it.)

It’s a little awkward, sure, each time, but it works. No matter how aghast or uncomfortable or amused they are, his professors sure goddamn _notice_ when their cute little sad-faced freshman hangs his tawny head in shame and says _gosh I’m so sorry um it was just a prank I guess but it’s um all my clothes and I don’t get paid until the end of the month I’m awfully sorry, ma’am._

What they do after that’s their prerogative. The more conservative ones insist on giving him a coat to borrow for class, most likely ‘cause they just can’t stand lecturing out and letting their eyes catch on someone in the front row whose shirt says ANYBODYS in bold and sloppy red. 

(That’s the only one that Brian’s pretty sure he hasn’t been _called_ , at least not within earshot, but Brian can’t resist a West Side Story reference.) 

It’s a bit awkward to sit in class and deal with pointing and giggling and gasping and all that, but Brian’s worn weirder shit, to be honest. Dance costumes. Facepaint. Makeup. Bodysuits and mascot costumes. He even rocked a slutty cheerleading skirt in high school, in organized protest against the newer, shorter uniforms, a surprise moment of cross-the-aisle solidarity between feminist GSA nerds and jocks-dating-cheerleaders that ended in a _very weird_ detention full of hairy legs and then a lot of apology letters from the vice-principal. 

So Brian’s kind of in his comfort zone, wearing stuff that makes other people uncomfortable. He’s a theater kid. He does this shit for fun _._

And this _is_ fun, to his surprise. Viciously fun. To shake a reaction out of people. To make people smile and laugh or go pale and look away. To choose carefully where he sits at dinner and— 

“Pardon my reach—” he stretches, gets his finger on a ketchup bottle— 

and Nathan’s nose crinkles, and maybe he doesn’t _specifically_ remember calling Brian a cocktease, but if anything’ll jog his memory it’s seeing it scrawled up his sleeve, fuck you Nate— 

yeah, it’s a little fun. A little scary, a little embarrassing, but a little fun too. Right in his wheelhouse.

Plus, some things are surprisingly _nice._

A Fletcher frosh he’s never met before comes up to him and grabs his arm and apologizes. Brian has no fucking clue what he’s apologizing _for_ , but the redhead dematerializes before he can ask. 

A bitchy conversation drifts up from the Lemelson lower courtyard—some friends of Jackie’s who _definitely_ hate Brian’s guts—he winces preemptively when he hears his name but then the words drift by “ _—ow could they call_ _him_ _a slut, it’s Todd who’s a cheating fuck—_ ” and he actually smiles. 

And his stats professor—well, she’s so nice that Brian actually feels bad about it. 

Professor Rosenberg pulls him aside with _tears_ in her eyes _._ She pats his arm and asks if he’s okay. She tells him he needs to talk to somebody about this. She wants to bring this up with the faculty board. She offers to ask all of her classes to donate clothes _._

“It’s okay, Professor,” he shrugs. “I’m, um. Not too bothered about it, honestly. It’s not worth the trouble.” 

“Brian, it’s certainly worth the trouble,” her voice has an edge in it, not angry, but serious. “This language is hateful—it’s, it’s _violent_ , that people are calling you that.”  

He meets her eyes then, tries to smile, defuse her tension, a little nonplussed that she’s so worked up about the word _EASY._ “Uh, I know it’s not very nice. But it’s kind of—it’s not the worst—I’m kinda used to it.” 

Her face distorts into something truly grief-stricken, and Brian almost gives the whole fuckin’ game away, backtracking. “No, no, it’s okay. I mean, more like—” he pauses. “I could bum some clothes off my friends, if I really needed to, yknow?” 

She’s looking at him very hard, still gently touching his arm, head inclined. Brian bites his lip. He wants her not to worry. He wants her to understand. He’s _fine_. More than fine. So he goes on. 

“I’d rather just have it out there? What people say. It’s worse if no one knows.” 

There’s something in the wrinkle of her brow, below her frizzy brown-grey hair, that shifts in sudden microexpression. It’s subtle, but it’s there. He squirms, gut clenched with guilt, because he suddenly feels pinned, feels like maybe she knows what he’s done, all of it, not just that he’s disrupting her class on purpose but also that he’s _lying_ , that it’s all a clever scheme, that maybe this was a bad idea—

“Ah. That’s quite a brave language reclamation project you’re spearheading, then.” 

“I’m s—” he’s halfway through apologizing when he parses that, blinks. 

“You should do whatever makes you feel best,” she pats his arm, and lets him go. “That’s the right thing to do. Just let me know how I can help.” 

She smiles at him, still a little sad, but warm and kind and understanding, and Brian’s speechless, almost dizzy as his guilty conscience suddenly unravels into a rush of _gratitude_. That maybe she understands. Maybe she knows why he rejected her kind offers, of donations or help or a shoulder to cry on. That maybe she gets why he _needs this_. 

Brian still feels a little dishonest, when he settles himself into the front desk and folds his legs underneath him to sit and take notes on probability distributions, but he finds himself smiling anyway.

* * *

Phase two is not supposed to start until a solid week has passed, but Pat only lasts a day and a half before he shows up at caf and kisses Brian hello and turns around to get out the lighter and— 

“ _Pat!_ ” Brian gasps. “This is your favorite jacket!” 

“Uh-huh.” Pat doesn’t turn around, but Brian can hear the smile. It’s certainly a _bold_ aesthetic choice, bright red across the dark denim of his hybrid jacket-hoodie. Brian finds he feels so grateful—that’s weird, why is he so _grateful_ —that he might cry, actually. He pushes that feeling away.   

“I like to _borrow_ this jacket,” he whines, instead. 

“Good thing you’re also a fag, then,” Pat turns, smirking. Brian gives up resisting, dives into his arms, tackles him, and covers him with kisses of solidarity. 

“Have your profs given you trouble?” Brian asks, and Pat laughs. 

“Nah. I don’t think my phil prof even noticed. And the rest are just tryin’ to figure out who the fuck this guy is who just showed up in the front row.” 

Brian snorts, and kisses him, and gets to work. It’s a pretty uneventful shift, Pat on back as usual, flipping burgers, just slow enough that Brian can glance at a few flashcards, here and there, not slow enough to really crack a book. Most of the custies are random students, and no one says a word to Brian other than their order, and then _thanks._

Until about midnight. There’s a few kids left lazing around waiting for food, and Brian hears the door jingle, looks up with his customer service smile. 

“Hi, Frank.” Brian’s done enough improv to know how to vamp, even when his heart skips. 

“Gilbert.” Franklin’s quiet, as he steps up to the register. Looks up at the menu, as if he’s ordering, but says lowly. “What the _fuck_ is your game.” 

Ah, so that’s how they’re gonna play it, then.  

Brian smiles blankly and says. “Sorry, I can’t make those drinks. Those are from, like, the real café, the day shift. Student caf’s just these over here, on the little board.”

Frank’s eyes flick down, examining him. They make Brian shiver a little, but he still thinks they’re pretty eyes. Brown-almost-amber, in a face that shouldn’t look so shrewd. It’s round and dark and soft-skinned. He shouldn’t look so _angry_. It spoils it. He looked better when he was smiley and high and rambling about why everyone should join interhouse softball. 

“Cut the crap,” he says. 

“Okay,” Brian offers nothing. “So are you gonna order? I’m not supposed to chitchat on shift.” He points into the corner, at the security camera. “I get in trouble.” 

Frank bares his teeth, but stays tight. Controlled.

“You’re a liar, Gilbert. And you’re gonna pay for it.” 

“Yeah, Pat passed along the message,” Brian permits himself to snark,because he’s _tired_ of this shit. “I’m sorry he hit you, okay? But you’re just being ridiculous.” 

“You’re telling people I’m a rapist.” 

“I’m actually not. Maybe Pat is. But I don’t—I dunno how I feel about it, really, Frank. One way or another. But I’m not _saying_ it.”

There’s something strangely searching _,_ in Franklin’s expression, but his tone is still tight with anger.

“You’re trying to get me expelled. Stop playing innocent.” 

“I’m trying to get you to _drop it._ I don’t wanna friggin’ think about it anymore, and I don’t want you and Pat to think about it, and I just want it to be _over._ I wish no one had ever known. I wish _I_ hadn’t known. I wish I’d just woken up with a hangover and been—” he pauses, breathes a quick huff. “But then there was a fucking _video_ , and you guys posted it, and people have been giving me shit about it ever since. Which fucking _sucks._ So I’m sorry if people are calling you names or whatever? But deal. It’ll blow over. Trust me.” 

There’s a long pause. 

“I didn’t post the video,” Frank says, finally. 

“I know,” Brian gives a wry smile. “Pat said so. He says you’re too smart for that.” 

“I didn’t fucking—” he snorts out air. “I didn’t want that out there. I regretted it already. The next day. I was fucking—and I _knew_ we’d get in trouble. All of us. Why would I want that?” 

Brian shrugs. “I believe you. So why’re you—” 

He’s trying to say _why are you mad at me and not Todd_ when two things happen, simultaneously. 

First, he remembers something. Maybe he sees it in Franklin’s face, or maybe it’s just because he’s thinking about it, or maybe it’s coincidence. But he _remembers_ , from the black hole of unconsidered events of that night, from that collection of garbled pleasant-awful-glorious-hateful moments, he remembers how Frank looked over at Todd, and his face was open and tender and longing. And oh, yeah, that kinda makes sense, then. 

Second, Pat grabs him and jerks— 

he says something, but Brian’s not listening— 

he’s using every millisecond of his reaction time to turn and grab and wrap himself around his boyfriend’s skinny body, bury his head in Pat’s shoulder and lock his arms in a tight hug and throw his weight unsteady so Pat either has to catch him or throw him right the fuck on the ground. 

Franklin, thank god, flees, and Pat shouts as he goes but the tactile sensation of Brian clinging to him is enough—

“—hat the fuck was he saying to you,” is the first thing Brian hears, over the pounding in his ears. 

“Nothing important,” he responds, instinctively, and that’s the wrong thing to say because Pat makes a strangled sound of anger and shifts below him. Brian’s body _knows_ Pat, knows Pat really really well, and he knows that if he weren’t wrapped tight around then he’d be getting pushed, grabbed, forced eye-to-eye with Patrick’s fiery gaze and told in no uncertain terms that it _is fucking important Brian don’t you dare fucking lie about this—_

The sentiment, Brian appreciates. But he prefers not having it shaken into him, thanks. 

“Chill the fuck out,” he murmurs into Pat’s neck. “He’s scared as shit that I’m gonna get him expelled. That’s all.” After a beat, he adds. “Please don’t let go.”  

Pat grunts, and shifts, all ragged breaths and foiled adrenaline. “Did he threaten you,” Pat mutters, but acquiesces, wraps his arm around Brian’s waist as best he can. 

“He would have if he’d thought of anything.” Brian rubs his face against Pat’s scruffy cheek, trying to touch as much of their skin together as possible. It soothes him, touching, and maybe it’ll soothe Pat. “But mostly he just told me to stop. That it wasn’t his fault. He never meant for it to happen. Appealing to my sense of fairness.”

“Hah!” Pat grips him with his fingertips, hard and then gentle. “What’d you say?” 

“Fuck off,” Brian loosens a bit, pulls back to look up with a smile. “I do what I want.”

“Good.”

“Did I do good?” He prompts again, anyway, pushes his arms upward, around Pat’s shoulders, slow-dance style. Pat’s body takes the cue, slides his arms around Brian’s waist, leaving them close and breathing in each others’ faces. “You proud?”

“Yeah,” Pat kisses down at him, and Brian grins up into his mouth as he adjusts his grip to something more tender, heat of anger fading into other types of heat, as he is shifted without moving. _J’adoube_. 

He waits until the kiss turns _just barely_ into some grinding, Pat’s dick starting to get interested, before he pulls away and smirks. “Well I think I deserve some wings, then.” 

Pat groans and brushes back his hair with a shaky hand, scowls. “ _Fuck_ you, Brian, that takes like forty minutes.” 

“I know,” he chirps. “That’s why you only make them for me. Because you _love_ me.” 

“I hate you,” Pat growls as he stalks back out to the patio. Brian smacks him on the ass, as he goes. 

* * *

There’s still more to come, after that night, but when they curl up in Pat’s bed at 4am and hold each other, Brian can’t help feeling that the hardest part is over. He always knew Pat’d be the tough bit. Not getting Pat on board, exactly, but keeping him there—stopping him from jumping over the edge and plunging fifty feet into the choppy waters below. 

Pat knew it, himself, even. 

 _What if people fuck with you_ , he’d growled, after the secret council was dismissed, into Brian’s hair, and Brian assured him that people fuck with him no matter what. 

 _What if someone tries to hurt you_ , Pat looped back, more firmly, and Brian grinned brilliantly and joked that he was far too cute to punch. 

 _What if someone harasses you,_ Pat laid out again, the tenth or eleventh iteration of this statement, chasing Brian’s king around the board, trying to mate. 

Brian stroked Pat’s hair and tried to explain. It’s the point, the harassment. The teasing. The weird looks. That’s why it’s going to _work_. Making unseen things red and bold and ugly. Even if nothing ever comes of it besides just making a lot of people feel uncomfortable, feel guilty, feel angry. Brian’d be happy with that. That’d be enough. 

 _What if someone pulls that shit around me,_ Pat finally asked, which is maybe what he’d been trying to ask all along. _What do I do_. 

 _Nothing, Pat,_ Brian murmured in his ear. _That’s the game._

There was a long pause. _What if I can’t do nothing._

Brian rattled out some long spiel about the ethics of revenge, backwards-looking and forwards-looking motives, how well this plan was going to work on its own, etc etc… 

 _What if I can’t stop myself,_ Pat cut him off, a soft sound of just breath. _Even if I want to._

It hitched in Brian’s chest a little, the sound of whispered shame in the violet-dark. 

 _I’ll stop you_ , Brian assured him. _I’ll help._

* * *

The weekend before phase two begins kicks off in Goodwill, hunting for clothes to sacrifice to the angry revenge gods. Well, that’s the stated plan, anyway. About twenty minutes into clothes-hunting, Simone gets some wild idea about the Ridley lounge— 

_oh my God we could introduce, like, formalwear requirements and then charge the twerps from other houses to rent smoking jackets—_

and Jenna has some thoughts about blazers that are apparently way too clever for a Lem, so Simone kidnaps her and Pat to lay the groundwork for her latest scheme. Before you know it, Ash and Legs have slipped off somewhere to look at doo-dads, and then it’s just Brian and Roy and the awkward ill-matched conjunction of men’s knitwear in front of them. 

“How you holdin’ up,” Roy says without looking, shifting clothes on the rack.

“Good,” Brian nods.

“Anyone giving you trouble?” 

“Not more than I asked for,” Brian flashes a faint smile.

It’s hard for Brian to get a read on Roy. They don’t talk much. Not because they have beef—they should, maybe—but Brian really _likes_ Roy, actually. Roy’s one of the reasons Brian’s a Lem at all, the understated way he sidled up to every gangly weird frosh and asked how things were going like he really _cared,_ and told you which TAs were nicest, and told you to avoid Parker House dinner on Thursdays if you didn’t happen to bring a poncho to college with you. It was comforting. Unserious, but responsible. A good person to have in charge. 

“So, who’s giving you trouble,” Roy repeats, unperturbed. 

“Eh, it’s no trouble,” Brian backtracks. “And the professors have got over it now I think.” 

“That’s good.” His eyes flick up. “I have to say, I’m not sure how that all’s gonna go for me. Any tips?”

“Um,” Brian wavers. “I try to be polite? If they really flip out about the language like, just say sorry and drop it. Like, Professor Wheeler probably will? Maybe don’t even bother, with him.”

Roy hums and moves a few steps, around the rack. “Wheeler likes me. I blew the curve on the orgo final last year. I think he’ll tolerate it.” 

“Nice,” says Brian, who doesn’t think Wheeler will ever, ever like him even if he aces the orgo final standing on his head. Still, it might help melt that icy glare, if Roy shows up to Wheeler’s upper-level classes in similar attire. Roy’s pretty well-liked in general. By the professors, and the students too. There are rumors about him, of course—but there are rumors about _everybody_ —and honestly, most of the rumors about Roy are actually about Pat.    

When Roy finds a sweater he’s happy with, Brian dares to ask. “What’re you gonna write?” 

“Still deciding,” he shrugs. “Something racial, probably. Unless you think it’s against the spirit of the project…?” 

“No, no, that sounds great,” Brian says quickly, then reddens. “I mean, awful, but. Yeah. Go for it.” 

“ _Chink_ ’s a classic, then,” Roy smiles a little. “Or some variant. My freshman year I mostly got called _Pikachu_ but I don’t know if that’ll read right, in context. People might just think I’m a big fan.” 

Brian snorts and also winces, which must do something funny to his face because Roy outright laughs.

“All right, I got what I need,” Roy lifts his sweater. It’s got a bit of a Charlie-Brown aesthetic in muddled yellow. “Let’s go collect the others, shall we? Before they end up buying something stupid.” 

They don’t quite manage that. It takes a while to talk Simone out of her frenzy to buy up all the gaudiest formalwear, so they miss Ash and Allegra sneaking over to the register in the meantime. The two are overly pleased with their new acquisition—some bizarre art-deco spiked device, fascinating in an intricate mechanical way—but Brian can’t figure out why they’re so hype until they’re on the way home. 

Ash leans over while Roy and Legs argue about whether it’ll make an acceptable prize for the next Lem karaoke nite. 

“ _It’s a vintage vibrator,_ ” she hisses. 

Brian snorts a laugh and resolves not to sing _that_ well next Tuesday. 

* * *

Brian has one class with Ashley, who went with _FRIGID_ , and one with Jenna, who stuck with the classic _DYKE._ It was pretty uneventful with Ash—she just slid into class and crossed her arms and said nothing and the professor was cool with it—or at least he was tired of arguing with Brian. 

Jenna was more direct, marched straight up to the front of their English seminar and said _so Brian’s my friend and this is something we’re doing in solidarity to combat bullying._ She’s more eloquent about it than Brian thinks he’ll ever be, straightforward and simple and brooking-no-argument. The professor is if anything a bit intimidated: just waves her off with a nod and an _ok fine sure yeah._

Their success bolsters Brian a little. Hopefully the others won’t have trouble. Hopefully he’s not dragging other people into a disaster. Hopefully the seniors have an easy time of it—he doesn’t have a lot of class crossover with Simone or Allegra—so they’re gonna have to give their explanations fresh, unless the faculty gossip really _has_ moved fast. At least all Pat’s profs were chill. But that means nothing, really, because they’re all like film studies profs and probably wouldn’t bat an eye if he showed up naked. 

No one bitches, though. No one pulls out, or looks put-upon. No one complains at all, no matter how many times Brian asks _how it’s going_. They all just say _good_ and grin and keep right on with it. 

So for a week or two, Brian’s not sure what’s gonna happen next. 

He goes to class, takes notes, and doesn’t have to explain anything to anyone anymore. 

He hears murmurs here and there, between students and professors, the news of his strange plight- _cum-_ crusade filtering out into the masses. 

He sees Simone in the wild, moving with that loping stride she uses when she’s in a hurry, back of her thin silk blouse scrawled with _STONE COLD BITCH_ in tidy cursive. Other students are giving her a wide berth, but that’s not unusual. 

He argues with Legs— 

she got _thrown out of class,_ and Brian freaked out a little and kinda scolded her for it. Not for using the c-word. Like, that’s fair enough, own it if you want. But according to Pat she completely _refused_ to cover it up, even at the professor’s insistence— 

“Eh, fuck him,” Legs gestures. “I explained the whole fuckin’ story and he was like: _keep your activism out of my classroom._ And I was like, _y’know what? I think I will. And my body is activism to you apparently, so sorry._ ” 

Pat snorts. “That’s not what you said.” 

“Shut up Pat,” she scowls. “I cleaned it up in post. But I still think he basically _was_ saying that my cunt wasn’t welcome in his classroom, so fuck that.” 

Brian groans and buries his face in his hands and murmurs to himself _oh my god we’re all going to get expelled please stop swearing at professors_ — 

Pat strokes his back comfortingly. “Kid, chill. Legs isn’t gonna get expelled. That was definitely not the worst thing she’s said to a professor. Not even the worst thing she’s said to Sterling this _year_.” 

“He’s a fuckwit,” she snorts. “And yeah, don’t stress about it, Brian.” 

“I just don’t want you to get in trouble because of me,” he says plaintively, dragging his head up. “It’s not worth all that.” 

“Eh, this is bigger than you now, kid,” she pats his knee, words oddly Pat-like in their comfort and their inevitability. They’re flanking him now, one on each side. “We’re all in it now.” 

“Indeed,” Pat intones, serious as a churchbell’s chimes.

* * *

Roy doesn’t explain how the week goes for him, and Brian doesn’t ask. Brian doesn’t feel like it’s his place to ask. Brian doesn’t usually get up in Roy’s space—honestly, he’s been avoiding him for the better part of a year. 

It’s a little stupid, the avoiding. If anything, _Roy_ should be the one that avoids _Brian._ Lord knows, he’s got enough reason. Brian was trouble from the very first week—probably earlier, really—the source of several late-night meetings and endless discussions about how to _handle the situation._ All that shit, right off the bat, and then immediately the trouble of lobbying for a coed room and then right after that his overloaded course schedule and then after _that_ his sneaky work-study work-arounds and then—

 _So you smoke, huh?_ Roy opened their first real, full-length conversation, right at the end of Fall term. He was calm, hands-in-pockets casual, using a tone that was eerily similar to the one Pat used to say _so are you gonna forfeit now or…?_

Brian scrabbled for excuses for why, exactly, he’d been found on the roof last night rolling joints with Jenna. And not just that. Leading a half-a-dozen other Lem frosh down the path of sin, sharing his newfound caf hookups for good quality Ridley weed. He logically knew he wasn’t gonna get arrested or kicked out or probably even told off—  

—but he still felt the need to stutter some excuses, apologies that bounced off Roy’s wry smile.

_You’re not in trouble. Just wanted to check in._

_Sorry, um, for giggling so loud. Won’t happen again._

_All good,_ Roy said easily. _Just keep it down at 3am, ey? It’ll really kill your buzz if you have Stephanie screaming at you in her sleep mask._

Brian apologized again, a few times, but Roy wasn’t there to collect apologies it seemed. 

 _But yeah, I wanted to check in on you. That Ridley crowd can do some pretty wild stuff_.

Brian flushed and could come up with nothing better than _yeah_. 

 _Maybe you do some wild stuff too._ Roy continued, tone gentle, aimless. 

_Maybe._

He didn’t mean to go tongue-tied and taciturn whenever Roy tried to talk to him. That inscrutable well of patience, of calm, it was sort of bewildering—why Roy was so _nice_ to Brian, even now, even knowing he fucked with Pat Gill— 

 _This is probably overkill,_ Roy continued. _But I just wanted to let you know. And the other freshmen, too. If you ever feel in over your head—with drugs, with drinking—you can talk to me about it. I won’t make it weird._

Brian hoped his internal flinch wasn’t visible. _Thank you, but I’m really—I’m good. I’ve uh. Done this stuff before. At least a bit._

 _Still,_ Roy drawled on. _Doesn’t mean things can’t go south._

 _Uh-huh._ Brian bristled, unsure about the innuendo, stiff-backed and tight-jawed and ready for a trick, a dry twig resisting pressure and preparing for the splinters. _Yeah, I uh, I know, Roy. I’ll uh, keep it in mind._

He forced his exasperation down, out, his shame and his annoyance, and plastered on his don’t-worry-about-me smile, the one designed for Laura. To no avail. Roy just brushed it aside. 

_Look I’m just trying to say. I know you’re friends with Patrick. And he’s not a bad guy. But he mixes his sins. So like, if you get overwhelmed, let me know. Or tell Legs._

_Roy, I—_ Brian paused, held himself steady, even though his back was up. Because it hardly seemed right. To defend Pat to Roy. Of all people _._ His better judgment dragged against his irritation, slowed it. _I know everyone thinks he’s corrupting me or whatever. But he’s not. He’s never talked me into something I didn’t want to do. Drugs, or anything. Except learning chess, I guess._

Roy smiled, at that, or maybe he’d been smiling all along and Brian’d just now turned to really look. _Not exactly what I’m worried about. No offense, but you seem pretty tough to talk into anything. No matter what people say._

 _Hah._ He felt himself pulling up his knees, nervous, this conversation skittering over untested ice. Roy was a good guy. Always going to bat for his freshmen, asking how classes were going, giving homework tips, offering advice—far too good a guy to let personal antipathy get in the way of his duties, whatever he saw them to be. _Yeah, I’m good. So, um, is there something in particular you’re…worried about?_

At this, Roy sighed and drew a hand through his close-buzzed hair, as if brushing it aside. Maybe a leftover tic from when it was longer. _I’m not looking for details. None of my business. I just heard you guys were hanging out a lot, and—_ he snorted a laugh— _as someone who used to hang out with Pat a lot, I know that can get a little volatile. He gets in fights._

 _He wouldn’t fight me, Roy._ The senior’s face looked skeptical. _Even if we were high. He feels bad even beating me in chess._

 _Feeling bad about something usually doesn’t stop Pat from doing it._ Roy picked his way around his words delicately. 

Brian scrunched his face up, feeling a sudden headache coming on, a surge of tiredness. Tired of well-intentioned warnings. Tired of raised eyebrows. Tired of reasonable suggestions. Tired of slick-lipped _i-told-you-so_ ’s. Couldn’t Roy see he was a lost cause—a moth to a flame—innocence long sacrificed to the crucible—a pock-marked piece of campfire glass? 

_We’re not, like, dating. So you don’t have to worry about it. We just work together._

Roy sighed and gave Brian a don’t-bullshit-me look. A little sharp, but softened by the turn of his head, the way he switched his gaze up deliberately to the half-flickering fluorescents. _Well. Nothing’s ever that simple, Brian._

 _I’m sorry he hit you_ , Brian said, bluntly, ‘cause the conversation was making him sick-stomach annoyed and god, he just wanted it out, over, done. _That’s shit. You must be pissed that we’re friends._

 _No, no_ , Roy looked down sharply. _I’m not pissed. I like Pat, Brian. He’s a good dude. Wild, little stupid sometimes, but a hell of a lot of fun._

_What he did to you isn’t right. He regrets it. He wouldn’t do it again, I think._

_You don’t know what he might do,_ Roy said evenly, but he didn’t look angry. _You don’t know what_ _you_ _might do. We weren’t in our right minds that night, Bri. He fucked my face right up._ He paused, eyed Brian keenly, and something in his words hit with more weight. _And I’m not even sure I didn’t deserve it. It’s hell, to not remember a thing like that._

Brian had no fucking idea what to say to that, so he said nothing. 

_So. Save yourself a lot of grief, and just...try not to play with fire, all right?_

_Okay, Roy._

_For clarity’s sake,_ Roy said dryly. _Patrick’s not the fire. But he’s pretty flammable, okay? So use your head. Store him away from the oxidizers._

Despite it all, the awkwardness, the nerves, the guilt and the annoyance, Brian laughed at that. And somehow through the transformative power of chemistry jokes that conversation was transmuted into something more than ash and flames. It burned and stung and gritted the whole way through. But afterward. Good came of it. 

* * *

“I was wrong,” Pat says, _propter_ nothing. 

“Huh?” Brian looks up, confused. He’s on his elbows on the floor, glancing over Pat’s draft—he makes Pat print them these days ‘cause he likes correcting in pen. “I mean, it all looks fine, I’d probably not spell out _videlicet_ that’s like, super pretentious, but you do you—” 

“No,” Pat grunts, and pushes his chair away from his desk, from where he’s pretending to look over Brian’s orgo homework. “I mean about your whole—this whole scheme.” 

Brian smiles then, a rather shit-eating grin, and rolls on his back. “Oh my _God_ , Pat, is this finally it?” He starfishes his arms wide and wiggles his toes, wallowing for a minute theatrically. “The part where you tell me I’m a genius and you’ve been so so wrong and how you’re gonna make it up to me?” 

“Yeah,” he hears the sigh, “yeah, it’s that part.” Pat moves slow and deliberate to a crawling posture, knees inching up around Brian’s hips, hands planted flat on either side of his head. It’s intense, having Patrick’s dark swirling gaze staring down when he’s got that _I’m about to apologize_ look which is among his most serious. The full force of his handsomeness is exaggerated from this under-frowning angle; his sharp jaw, the thin-rimmed glasses, the frame of silky hair. He’s only got a day or so of stubble—not enough to see it really, can’t spot the white patch Brian’s fond of—but when they kiss Brian’s gonna feel the familiar roughness against his cheek. 

“I love your face,” Brian says, without thinking. 

Pat sucks a breath, surprised, and then his mouth twists. He looks like his momentum was unseated, but he’s not that unhappy about it. “Is this a bit?” 

“No,” he says, and smiles. “It’s just really close to me right now and I remembered.” 

“How do you feel about my _other_ parts?” Pat cants his hips ever so slightly, tone drawn-out with dripping sarcasm and just a little wicked. 

Brian almost says something flirty back—something like _move ‘em closer daddy and let’s find out_ —his face even constructs the appropriate sexy naughty smirk— 

and he only saves himself at the absolute last second, because he realizes what Pat just asked.  

“I love you,” he says breathlessly, too earnest for their teasing banter. “All your parts.” 

Pat closes his eyes, tenses, as if he can’t bear to see. Or be seen. “There’s some fucked-up parts.”

“Yup,” Brian bends his arms, curls fingertips around his wrist. “Love ‘em too.”

“You’re just like—” Pat starts, tone a little thready, and then stops. “Stupid. You’re stupid. I’m the one that—I fucked it up. I didn’t think about consequences. I didn’t think about _you_.” 

“Yeah, mm, Patrick,” Brian says gently. “If I only dated people that were perfect, I’d still be a virgin, okay?” 

“Cut it out,” Pat gruffs, and their faces are so close together Brian can feel the hot wet air. “Don’t be an idiot. I created this mess. You can’t deny it. I make your life harder.”

He’s pushing, not _angry_ , but quite serious. Seeking that condemnation he thinks he deserves. If he doesn’t get it, he’s gonna seethe inwardly. If he does get it, he’s gonna feel hurt, and seethe outwardly. Complicated, Pat is complicated.

“Yeah, but yknow. I make your life hard sometimes too. Sometimes you have to carry me around for half a term.” He taps his foot against Patrick’s. “You’re weak in the temper, I’m weak in the ankles. Ya know how the song goes. _Some. times in our lives. we all have pain—_ ” 

Pat snorts. “Stop singing in my face. I’m trying to fuckin’ apologize for being an asshole—” 

“ _Lean on meeeeee—_ ” 

“Brian. I get it, okay—”

 “ _I’ll be your friend—I’ll help you caaaaaaaarry on—”_

“Please just let me—”

“ _I’m gonna neeeeed—_ ”  

“Stop it, you little shit,” Pat’s moving on from earnest toward exasperated, “I’m fucking trying to tell you—” 

“ _Pleeeeeease swallow your priiiiide—_ I bet you don’t even know this verse— _if I have things you need to boooooorroowww—_ ”

Pat _growls_ , and Brian laughs at him and just keeps singing until Pat claps a knobbly hand over his mouth. His breath is stuttering and his face is dark but also _light_ , like he’s angry about how much he wants to laugh, amused-annoyed as ever by his little brat boyfriend. 

“ _mmll mv mr nnnmds mmd mm mn mmmd mmmw,_ ” Brian continues to sing, against the broad hand on his mouth, and he wonders for a second what Pat’s gonna do if he keeps pushing. Probably fold. 

Pat just _stares_ , dark and swirling and bewildered and annoyed and amused and loving. It’s a lot of attention, a lot of _feelings_ , and Brian basks in it. They’re complicated. But Brian loves them. Loves that he can _elicit_ them. 

“You’re riling me up,” Pat says, finally, and draws his hand away, plants it back near Brian’s head. 

“Is it working, _papi?”_ Brian goads, because if he hits this right this turns into hot sex instead of cold brooding.

“Yeah,” Pat grunts. “But you shouldn’t have to.” 

“That’s what Roy said,” Brian breathes out suddenly, and it’s the wrong fucking thing to say, _so_ wrong, but he has this sudden vicious memory— 

( _When Pat gets worked up he can be rash._  
_Yeah, Roy, I know. He doesn’t usually get like that around me, though. I know how to—_  
 _Brian. No. You shouldn’t have to be the one that calms him down._ )

—and now, as then, he can’t figure out what to say next. 

Pat doesn’t look scandalized, though, doesn’t look the way that you should look when a partner brings up your ex mid-flirting, doesn’t look insulted or stubborn or even surprised. A little called-out maybe, but no more than that. 

“He’s right,” he says, leans up on his haunches, pressing his weight onto Brian’s thighs with his. “About that. And you were right. So I’m, uh,” he gives a smile that is more a grimace. “oh-for-two, there.” 

“It’s not bad that you were worried about me.” 

“Sure, but I was wrong. I thought you’d—” he hesitated, tongue just between his teeth. 

“You thought I’d what?” 

“Be like you were in first term.” Pat says, and looks up briefly, above Brian’s head. “I still remember you standing in here, shaking, calling yourself a slut. God, you looked so _sick_ with it.”

Brian tries to cast his mind back to that feeling, the day he told Pat about it all. It is...it _is_ distant, in its way. Back then he was...well, unsure. About Pat. About summer. About his choice of college, honestly—about whether he’d made a very expensive mistake. About whether there was something wrong with him, that he couldn’t make friends. Or afford his lab fees. Or choose someone to fall head-over-heels for that could stand to be seen with him. 

He didn’t _really_ think of himself as a slut, then. Or maybe he didn’t really think of it as a bad thing to be. Or maybe…

“Maybe I’m different, now,” he says, up into Pat’s wide searching face, reclaims his gaze. 

“You are,” Pat affirms, and kisses down into him, that languid slow-paced kiss, open with promise.

* * *

Simone _said_ that things would, quote, “blow up in a big way, babycakes!” ‘round about week three, and as usual, she was right. 

First, he just noticed it here and there. A burly jock with a t-shirt that said COCKSUCKER. A crew of Ridley freshmen, walking six abreast down the sidewalk, giggling, all their jackets proclaiming BITCH! in sparkly red glitter. Some guy with wide pale eyes and wispy hair whose shirt was streaked with, simply, _HER_. 

(Brian doesn’t know him, but he’s seen him before. He has two shirts like that, actually. The other one says _IT._ ) 

He doesn’t see much of Frank or Todd—doesn’t see much of them in general anyway—he maybe _glimpses_ Todd in the student center once but he has no time to check because the figure beats a hasty exit before they even make proper eye contact. Franklin, he _definitely_ spots lurking outside of caf one night, but he doesn’t wander in again to make his pointless threats. Brian’s heart is in his fucking throat for a few minutes— _god,_ what if Pat—

but Pat moseys on in a few minutes later, munching on chicken nuggets and not visibly bleeding, so it seems like things went okay. 

It’s just like that, spots of tell-tale color and moments that jerk out unexpected smiles, until Thursday. The reporter finds him on Thursday, between classes. Some girl points him out, actually, Brian sees it happen—she’s chatting with a guy who has a little yellow legal pad and no other identifying markers but somehow looks like he’s here to _get the story_ on something.  

A gesture that most certainly looks like “ _that’s him_ ” sends the guy wandering over with a wave. The girl, bouncy and tall, blonde ponytail, shuffles away. Brian doesn’t know her, but when she turns his heart catches a little, because _she’s_ wearing one too, and her shirt—it’s more of an artist’s smock, really, she might be on the way to studio—says _ASKING FOR IT._

He doesn’t have long to ponder, though, until the square-glasses square-jawed guy is a step away from him and asking if he has a minute and wants to share a few words…perhaps on the record...?

“Sure,” Brian says, stomach swelling with opening-night butterflies, the kind of nerves he has trained himself to love.  “Of course.” 

“So, are you the one who’s behind this—movement? protest?” 

“Uh, it’s not really a—an organized protest exactly? More of a grassroots thing. But I guess I’m the one that started it, yeah. Or more like it started with me?” 

“How did it start?” The guy shifts his little pocket recorder, and Brian takes a deep breath. Showtime. 

He tries to stay objective, as he traces out the basics. The prank, the clothes, the way first his friends and then other folks around campus joined in. He tries not to presume anyone’s motivations. He tries to report the facts. He tries to say things in a way that won’t make him look like a dipshit in print. 

“—so this—” the guy gestures with his notepad toward Brian’s chest, which says _FAGGOT,_ “ _—_ is something that other students have called you on campus?” 

“Um, yeah,” Brian tilts his head.

“To your face?” 

“Sure.” 

“And you’d call that a _prank_?” The tone isn’t snarky, but it’s leading, skeptical in that way that good reporters are. 

“Not really. I guess that’s not the right word. Pranks are fun. This is more mean-spirited. To be fair, I get ‘slut’ a lot more often than ‘faggot,’ though, I just felt like wearing blue today.”

He smiles artlessly at the reporter and grins as the guy notes something down. Brian has a couple more pull-quotes in him, if this guy’s willing to take the time. 

He is. Actually, their conversation drags on so long that Brian definitively misses his next class, but he doesn’t mention it. The guy frames his questions really well— _so what has your experience with the school administration been?_ —and asks about harassment— _I have noticed a lot of slurs on these shirts that could be considered hate crimes, what do you think about that?—_ and is generally polite— _so you mentioned that you’re ‘queer,’ is that something you feel comfortable with in print?_ —although who knows what the article’ll actually look like when it comes out. It’s totally possible that this nice well-spoken reporter dude will ignore his request to leave out the sex-tape origin story (he gave no details but the bare minimum) or fail to polish up his verbiage or attribute to him opinions about the administration that he’s definitely not saying in so many words. 

There’s a lot of damning with faint praise, sure, but Brian knows how to play the game by now. 

Well, he gets a little saucy when the guy asks _so what do you think the school should do to make the environment better for LGBT students? especially freshmen?_ because the quip flips off his tongue too fast, _man it’s nice to be asked that, I wish admin would ask me that sometime._

Oof. Pull-quote on that one too, which means Brian’s prolly gonna have to go to more _meetings_ some day, god help him. Maybe he’ll be less pants-shittingly terrified in front of the deans this time. 

“So what does it make you feel, seeing all these other students have been called slurs as well?” 

This sounds like a wrap-up question, the way he says it, so Brian tries to put a bow on it. 

“It’s been pretty crazy. I mean, I knew that I wasn’t—I wasn’t the _only_ one, but it’s been amazing seeing my friends and even strangers kinda standing up for me? And it’s terrible, the shit they’ve—sorry—” he drags his hand through his hair. “the _stuff_ they’ve been called. They’re really brave for putting it out there.” 

“Does it bother you, to see that kind of language around?” 

“No, no,” Brian says quickly. “I mean, it’s intense, but—it’s the opposite of what bothers me. What bothers me is the people saying it. This is about...taking it back. What people say about us, to us, against us. They don’t get to own it, anymore. We do.” 

He pauses, and then thinks _fuck it._ “And if admin doesn’t like it, they should go to the root of the problem. Not to us. ‘cause it’s not like I started this shit on _purpose._ ” 

Reporter-guy finishes his frantic scribbling, and shakes Brian’s hand, and gives him his business card. (He asks to exchange cards, actually, and Brian blinks for a second until the guy remembers that he’s a college student and instead accepts a post-it note with Brian’s phone number on it.)

And Brian feels pretty fuckin’ _awesome_ when he gets a copy of the article, because it’s got great pictures and some shit-stirring from Ridley folks, and the guy did right by his quotations for the most part and there’s no way, absolutely no way that admin will be able to ignore this. 

 _Good luck trying to fuck with me for the rest of the year, Todd_  he thinks to himself as he tapes a printed copy of the article outside he and Jenna’s door, the same place of hallway honor where the seniors are taping their acceptance letters and job offers. _Admin’s not gonna let you even_ _look_ _at me._

He’s relieved, so relieved, that this fucking ridiculous game is over. That he’s cut off all the avenues of escape. That with the fierce twin gazes of the media trying to write an exposé and the school trying to cover its ass, there’ll be no space to fit in dumbassery and he can just study for finals and buy some new clothes and make out with his uninjured boyfriend in peace.

This newfound sense of calm lasts almost exactly one calendar weekend.

* * *

On Monday, Simone calls. 

He mutes it, ‘cause he’s in class. 

She calls again. 

So he certainly has to take this one—he should’ve taken the first one, when would Simone ever call at nine am—he makes his quick exit, takes his bag with—gets out in the hallway and then upon further reflection gets out of the building entirely—misses the ringer but calls back immediately and connects with a breathless _hey simone hi what’s up what’s wrong?_

“I got good news and bad news,” she says, cuts right to the meat of it, voice short but not panicked _._

“Bad first,” he pants, but Sim’s already talking over him. 

“The bad news is your boyfriend is a _chickenshit._ I have him right here and he won’t tell you himself.” 

“ _Simone_ ,” Pat moans wetly in the background—Brian startles at the sound, cry-laughs in surprise. 

“The good news is that despite him fucking up he got the _ever-loving shit_ beat out of him for it, so maybe he’ll learn not to do it again.” 

“Fuck,” his words stagger on the inhale, get caught. “What—what happened? Is he okay? What—”

“He and Frankie duked it out,” she grunts, and Brian can _see_ her hand-wave, in his mind’s eye, nails glinting dismissively probably somewhere near to Pat’s face. “And Patty used the fucking _Sicilian opening_ like a dumb idiot and so he couldn’t win fast enough.” 

Brian knows the opening, but not well enough to know why it’s stupid. Why it wouldn’t win fast enough. He’s only been to one bout of chess-boxing in his entire first year, and it was fucking _brutal_ by round four. A Ridley House tradition, apparently, but not a very common one to be engaged in seriously, especially not since admin cracked down on their midnight fights. 

“Are you at the ER?” he cuts out of his thoughts, heart thudding, because if Frank won by knockout— 

“Didn’t go that far,” Simone assures. “Security busted it up less than halfway through. But this poor sweet dumbass isn’t allowed on campus until after his hearing. So we’re at his place, if you want to come over and hear him grovel.” 

“I’m coming now,” Brian says, shoving his scattered assortment of papers into his bag, and yeah he left his notebook in the lecture hall but _fuck it_. 

“ ‘Kay. We’ll be here. If you want to punch him right when you come in go for neck-down, he’s icing his stupid face right now.” 

“ _He’s in class Simone—_ ” 

“ _Yeah well he’s not anymore you dumbass he’ll be here in a few minutes—”_

 _“No he—I told you we should’ve waited—_ ”

Brian cradles the phone between his shoulder and his ear awkwardly, snapping his bag together as he listens to their arguing crosstalk. It’s comforting, a little, because though Pat sounds a little wet and strained he mostly just sounds guilty—and Simone sounds annoyed—not the way you’d sound if this was the worst thing that had ever happened. 

He takes a deep breath. In through his nose, five counts, three count hold, out through his mouth five counts. Then he’s ready to talk. 

“ ‘kay, I’m coming over. Tell Pat it’s okay. I got the lecture notes. And I forgive him.” 

She snorts. “I’m not letting you forgive him that easy. Get your ass over here and at least make him buy you dinner.” 

“ _Simo—_ ” 

Brian hangs up on Patrick’s fake-anguished whine of disguised relief, and starts hustling off-campus fast enough that he doesn’t have to think.

**Author's Note:**

> your comments are, as always, much appreciated. never be afraid of giving concrit either, especially as we traipse off further into the moral grey.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [kindling](https://archiveofourown.org/works/20593430) by [riverblujay](https://archiveofourown.org/users/riverblujay/pseuds/riverblujay)




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